


Lavender's Blue

by KrisseyCrystal (AisukuriMuStudio)



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Alternate Universe - Cinderella Fusion, Angst, Cinderella Elements, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, the Cinderella AU nobody asked for
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-02
Updated: 2018-08-16
Packaged: 2018-11-22 06:08:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 27,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11374170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AisukuriMuStudio/pseuds/KrisseyCrystal
Summary: In which Yusuke Kitagawa is a misused servant boy for a renowned artist and Akira is a prince pre-arranged to marry someone else, but somehow one fated meeting in a forest changes all that.Or, the obligatory Cinderella AU because why not.





	1. Sing, Sweet Nightingale

Once upon a time, in a faraway land, there lived a kingdom. Not an ordinary kingdom with yawning walls of stone and ivory, or columns of marble centered ‘round imperial thrones carved in gold, but a small one, with green grass and crop fields as far as the eye could see, with a few ducks, some cows, lots of chickens, and bellyfuls of very, very warm laughter.

The Kitagawa’s knew joy in their small, countryside household. It was painted on every wall, with every brush stroke Yusuke’s mother placed to the endless canvas her husband brought home from his wartime travels. She used to hold her son upon her lap while she went about her work, and Yusuke would watch with wide eyes the curve of her lines; the delicate scratch of her shading; and like magic, the picture that would then emerge under all of her hard work and attention.

They placed every one of her paintings upon their walls.

But pain came too early to the home, far too early for Yusuke to truly remember it. He was three when the knock on the wood beside their door came, when mother told him to wait by the table. They were supposed to be eating dinner, but mother’s food hadn’t yet been touched even though his was nearly gone. Yusuke remembers toddling to the hall, listening to the slide of their door, and leaning out to see mother talk to a complete stranger.

He thinks that was the moment he understood shadows. The ones that stretched behind his mother like a great expanse of darkness; the lines on her face as they grew heavy and sad. She seemed to age a thousand years in a moment, and briefly, Yusuke wondered about the power of a look.

The next few years were a blur. They no longer had enough money for their small kingdom when it was just the two of them, so mother tried to sell her art. It did not bring much income. Nobody knew the name Kitagawa, so what did her work hold over the human heart and awe? They were nice paintings, but nothing that could sit in a nobleman, samurai, daimyo, or king’s home. His mother was left with many apologies, but not very much success.

Yusuke does not remember when exactly Ichiryusai Madarame became part of their lives, but he remembers mother being desperate for his help because he was _real_. People knew his name. _Kings_ had his work in their palaces. And Yusuke does not quite remember why that was important, or why they moved from their little countryside home to Madarame’s estate, but he remembers mother taking his hand and telling him, “Everything will be okay now,” and he remembers trusting her because mother was always right.

Their small farm lives became a very distant memory that Yusuke would soon forget with time, and the normalcy of living with Madarame would become what he would know for the rest of his life.

At first, things were good. They were new. Madarame lived close to a _jokamachi,_ close to a castle town and the ruling castle of their land, and this was a luxury the Kitagawa’s had never known. Market food, though not as fresh as it had been from their own farm and filled with more fish than cattle beef, was still good, and still in abundance. For a time.

But things were not so good when mother began to be unable to get out of bed in the morning.

He and his mother were not the only ones living in Madarame’s estate, safe under the wings of the artist’s kindness, compassion, and tutelage.  There were two other beneficiaries, two young men whom Madarame allowed to live with him as apprentices. They were quite older than Yusuke when he arrived; the distance in age prevented any easy connection between them.

Yusuke was seven the first time Madarame asked him to help during one of his tutoring sessions with the two students. Mother was sick that day, unable to open her eyes with how her head pounded, and Yusuke had been filled with worry for her. He longed for the opportunity to do something, anything, to make her feel better.

Madarame assured him that by helping him, he would do just that.

So Yusuke took Madarame’s brushes to wash them. He returned quickly, hoping that the faster he completed this duty, the quicker she would recover. He did many simple errands that day for both Madarame and his apprentices, each to the best of his ability, as quickly as he could, and all for the promise that mother would rise the next day, well and fair. For a bit, he enjoyed it, even—the feeling of being useful and helpful; he reveled in it. What a marvelous joy to put his hands to work for another’s comfort! Especially for one so dear to him.

This happened often, whenever mother could not rise.

But as Yusuke grew older, the tasks began to not be so simple. He would be tasked to run to the market for eggs first thing in the morning, or sew any tears in the students’ or teacher’s cushions. Make sure the easels are set at the eve of the day and that all the household’s laundry is washed and dried and folded before retiring for the evening.

The commands continued even on the days mother could get up and work and paint, but they were far less cruel than on the days where she could not.

Yusuke began to secretly dread those days.

He resented the heavy tightness within his own chest that would rise when he would shake his mother’s shoulder to wake her, and she would tell him with a quiet, pained voice, “I’m so sorry, Yusuke, but I can’t today.”

Yusuke would put on a brave face for her; he always would. She deserved to rest without regret and worry, and he would grant her that. Straightening out the thin sheet covering her, he said, “There is no need for you to apologize, Mother. I’ll be all right.” He would wait until she closed her eyes to sleep the pain away, and then he would stand.

But oh, it felt monumental just to stand.

He was fourteen when he noticed their food began to dwindle.

Though Yusuke or one of the apprentices themselves would be the ones to prepare it, when Yusuke went to retrieve his and his mother’s portion, he began to find less and less put upon their own plates until it was just scraps.

When he asked Madarame as to the reason behind their small ration as compared to his apprentices or the artist’s himself, the man said, “I’m sorry, Yusuke, but I can’t afford to feed someone who won’t work their share. You understand, don’t you?”

And Yusuke, afraid of his mother’s failing health if she did not get enough to eat, didn’t think anything of volunteering to do the work that was expected of her. He took a canvas, some brushes, a spare easel that he knew Madarame nor his pupils would use, and a candle, and he set himself in a small corner in the room he and his mother shared. Legs crossed on the wooden floorboards, he painted well into the candlelit night after all his work had been done.

It was like he had been seized by something grand, something hopeful. After all, he had long since watched his mother and Madarame and the other students complete their magnificent work, fingers itching to get their own chance to try. Surely if Madarame saw what he could do, he would let Yusuke work in his mother’s stead to paint their wage in food.

But the next day, when Madarame saw what Yusuke had created, something changed in the man.

He laughed, and with him, so did his students.

Heat flooded Yusuke’s face and cheeks and he bowed his head humbly, waiting for the shame to pass.

“You think _this_ is art?” Madarame had said, voice skeptical and chiding. His eyebrow raised on that wide, square forehead. He tsked, and shook his head to look at the canvas he held within his hands. “Anyone could tell just by looking at this that it was done by a _child._ You need _years_ of experience before you think you can create anything of _worth_ , Yusuke.” And when he turned away, the elder man took the painting with him.

Yusuke never saw it again.

But he refused to give up.

Mother could not eat what she needed if he did not provide, so he continue to take a spare canvas when he could, some discarded paper—anything he could get his hands on—a woodblock, even—to sketch, to practice, to paint at whatever odd hour he had available between or after the chores given to him. He had to try his hand again and again at this elusive art he wanted to capture if he wanted his mother to eat.

And at last, at last, much a time later, when Yusuke had painted something that he thought would be of value, he took the finished piece to Madarame.

But this time, when Madarame saw the fruit of Yusuke’s efforts, he did not laugh. He did not smile. Deep, dark shadows crossed over the man’s face and made his gaze eerily unreadable as he surveyed Yusuke’s work.

“What is this?” he asked in a low voice that Yusuke had never heard from him before.

Unsure at what he was asking, the young man honestly answered, “I…had thought it would be obvious. It’s _Chūjō-hime_. She—“

“—I _know_ who she is,” Madarame cut him off, something snarling in his throat. There was something dangerous in his voice and in his eyes as they snapped to Yusuke. Yusuke had never seen that look on the man’s face, never—not even on the days he had been caught standing idly by when he could have been fetching water or brushing shoes. In Madarame’s hands, the canvas shook. Yusuke feared he may break it.

“I can fix it, if need be,” he offered. “Whatever is wrong with it, tell me, and I will improve, Sensei. I will do my best to make art worthy of—“

“— _shut up_!”

Yusuke’s lips jolted closed as if struck.

Madarame jabbed a finger into his chest, and it was hard. It hurt. “You will _not ever again_ call me ‘Sensei.’ Do you understand?” he muttered lowly. The finger jabbed again. “You are no student of mine, and you never _will_ be a student of mine. Do _not_ mistake your place here.” His voice hardened, and there was no doubt the conviction behind his following words. “You are. No. Artist. You are a _servant,_ and you will never _be_ anything more than a _servant_. So if I find you stealing _my canvases_ and _my paint_ again for you to try and pursue your little ‘fantasies’—I will kick you and your mother out of my house, and you will never know my kindness again. Are we clear?”

Yusuke’s heart shook within his ribcage. An image of his mother on a muddy street, dirty, pale and hungry in the rain passed the forefront of his mind. He cleared his throat. “Yes, sir.”

Madarame made a sound of contempt. “’Sir,’” he repeated with a sharp frown on his face. He tucked the canvas under his arm. “’Master’ will do, from now on.”

“Very well, Master.”

“Good.”

Two weeks later, Yusuke’s mother withered away.


	2. Cinderelly, Cinderelly

After the quiet passing of his mother, Yusuke was, for the first time in life, truly alone in the world.

It was a strange and hollow feeling to walk in his quarters at the end of a long day and no longer see her prone form on the mat next to his. The room was too silent without the sound of her pained breathing lulling him to rest. To each morning rise without hope of hearing mother’s unstrained voice—a hope that would mean he could breathe easier for just one day—was suddenly so much harder than before.

Somehow, with a single loss, all the color from the world was swiped away until the paint Yusuke would mix for Madarame and his pupils failed to be distinguishable to him.

Madarame began taking in more apprentices to account for the income mother could no longer provide him, though Yusuke wasn’t sure how that worked. Madarame never discussed business matters with him.

But Yusuke couldn’t help but notice that each new student he met was getting younger and younger.

In order to make room for these new pupils moving in, the artist had Yusuke moved to another section of the estate. So Yusuke set up home in the small attic above the stable where Madarame kept his horses. It was draftier than his old room in the main building of the estate, but it was airy. When it rained or snowed, the gaps in the roof planks would often let in precipitation, so it was hard to keep dry.

But when he put a sheet up to keep the moisture out and actually cleaned the place up, it began to feel somewhat cozy. For once, Yusuke had his own little niche in the world. There in his own little corner, in his own little chair, and far removed from the world, he was away from Madarame. And though Yusuke hated to harbor such resentment for the man who had been so kind as to take the Kitagawa’s under his wing, he grew to appreciate whatever distance he could get between his master and himself.

Nevertheless, Yusuke’s duties still took him right to the artist’s shadow day by day. And even though he had always been severely instructed not to be seen when potential buyers were present, somehow, Yusuke always knew the painting or woodblock that was being sold that day, regardless. It was inevitable—partly because Yusuke himself made it to be so. He very dearly wanted to keep a close eye on his mother’s paintings, and know to whose hands they would be sold. It was perhaps the last kindness he could give his mother, after everything she did for him:  to ensure that wherever her life’s works went, they were to places where they would be well-cared for and places where they could be admired.

Above all, Yusuke wanted his mother’s art to be admired.

He was eighteen when Madarame sold the last of his mother’s artwork—the day his life would forever be changed.

Yusuke remembers very clearly he had been sweeping. It was a cold winter day, so everyone had been wearing several layers over their clothes. Broom in hand, he himself had been moving carefully about the house with no shoes, but just the thickest socks he owned on his feet so as to make no sound. It was as he worked that he caught wind of a buyer who was intrigued about that “painting of a girl there,” so he paused what he was doing. He leaned in and listened.

Madarame made a pleased sound and there was a shift of canvas. A gentle bend of wood—perhaps he was setting the portrait on an easel? Yusuke sidled closer, back to the wall. If he craned his neck back far enough to take a glance into the room, he could even see the backs of Madarame and the guest’s winter _haori,_ their shoulders turned around a painting that Yusuke recognized in an instant as his mother’s. There was no mistaking that soft yellow background and the branch from the upper right hand corner.

But there was something…different about it, somehow. Something that seemed wrong.

“This is a good one,” Madarame murmured, and with that comment, Yusuke’s heart swelled with pride. The world was lighter than before. “You have good taste.”

“Who is she?” the guest asked.

Yusuke craned his neck further as Madarame answered, “Oh, no one of importance. I call her ‘Sayuri.’”

…no one of importance…?

A frown crossed Yusuke’s face. That was also not his mother’s name.

“Why does she look so…so _sad_? Or maybe I shouldn’t say sad, exactly, but _wistful_?”

“Ah, see, that’s the intrigue, isn’t it?” Madarame said, and he turned to his guest. Yusuke could catch a small sliver of his profile; the man was smiling without a crease in his brow. “It sits like an unfinished painting with all of that cloud in the corner—but really, I think that touch adds a level of _depth_ to it. A dozen people could look at it and interpret her gaze in a dozen different ways. And in the end, isn’t that what we _want_ out of art? To look at it again and again and always come away with something new?”

This was…nothing like what Yusuke knew his mother’s painting to be. He had seen her paint it. He _knew_ what was there; why did Madarame treat it like the message wasn’t clear?

And why did Madarame speak as if _he_ was the one who painted it?

The guest hummed as Yusuke tried his best to catch a better angle of the actual painting itself. Then the man spoke again. “It looks like the white here was painted on over something else. What was there before?”

A feeling of dread began to open up in the middle of Yusuke’s stomach.

“Oh, again, nothing of importance. I had an idea about what she should be looking at, but then I decided against it. It would be too much of a hassle to include it, too much of a burden. So I erased it. Anyway, she is better without now, wouldn’t you agree?”

_She is better without._

A faint, high-pitched hum whined in the back of Yusuke’s mind as the guest muttered something else and then confirmed that yes, _this_ was the piece he wanted to buy. They shuffled about, Madarame no doubt requesting another servant—one who _could_ be seen in front of guests—to come forward to take it as they moved toward the hall perpendicular to where Yusuke stood frozen.

They were a door down and did not turn in his direction, but as they passed his view to walk on, Yusuke still spotted this ‘Sayuri’ painting in its entirety. Finally, he could clearly see what had seemed so wrong before about his mother’s work.

Where there had been a babe in the lower left corner of the canvas stretch, cradled in his mother’s arms, now there was just white. A ‘cloud.’ A nothingness—a void.

He had, effectively, been erased.

Madarame had altered his mother's work.

Madarame’s glance turned his direction as they passed. Something in the man’s gaze hardened upon seeing Yusuke. But then—maybe it was something in Yusuke’s face, maybe it was how close he was to the doorway, maybe it was something in his form that gave way to what he’d just heard—the man’s expression changed. Madarame’s eyes began to laugh.

He _knew_ what he had said, even without Yusuke there to hear.

_She is better without._

Yusuke turned away and pressed his back to the wall hard. He forced himself to breathe.

So Madarame had meant it, then. When he said ‘is,’ not ‘was.’

‘Is.’

He had meant to say it.

Yusuke was better erased.

Yusuke wasn’t sure when he started moving. His feet seemed to roam before he was even aware of it. His set his broom against the wall and walked until he reached a side door. He slid it open, realizing as soon as his socked feet hit the mud softened from snow that he didn’t have his _zori_ , his shoes. Idly, he wondered if it was worth it to grab them.

His mind raced—and with it, gradually, did his own urgency.

What did it mean? What did it mean, that he was better erased? That he was better to be forgotten?

What did it mean, to be told you were better off as a nothingness?

Yusuke began to ran. His actions were a blur he would later not even remember, not be able to recall or explain. He grabbed a horse from Madarame’s stables—why? He’d never ridden one before—one of the mares he had often snuck down to tend to on the nights he couldn’t sleep. He didn’t even slip on a blanket or _kura_ or grab any reins. He jumped on to the poor horse and wrapped her mane around his hands and charged her off.

What did it mean, especially when all your life you had been trying to—to—

—what had he even been _doing_ all this time and putting _up_ with all this time, if his service didn’t matter? If he was better off _not even existing_?

The world spun. Suddenly. Sharply.

It took Yusuke a moment to realize it wasn’t just because of his thoughts, but because the world was literally _spinning_ as his horse came to a sudden stop and reared back. She made a cry of fright—and Yusuke, thrust violently out of his thoughts, became suddenly, equally terrified of falling off with nothing to keep him on the horse’s back.

He placed a hand to the mare's neck, called for her to calm herself and prayed _frantically_ that granted, just a moment ago he had been wondering if he should even be _alive_ but right now he _desperately wanted to be_ so please oh please don’t let him fall _—_

—but as the horse did indeed gradually still and calm herself, it was then that Yusuke finally saw it. Bent over the horse’s back with his _hakama_ awkwardly bunched up around his legs and his dirtied, muddied socked feet lying limp on either side of the horse’s panting stomach (when he thinks back on this moment, he thinks how hilarious he must have looked with his hair askew, riding a horse without any tack on, and brazenly holding on by his steed’s mane alone)—he sees the white deer.

Perhaps a wild boar would have been more shocking than a deer, especially in the winter, when hunting the land was more important than hunting the rivers and the sea. But Yusuke had never seen a deer before in person. To see one, let alone, such a glorious and proud _white_ one, was an honor Yusuke felt humbled by.

The creature was magnificent. Long antlers curving from its head towards the sky above them, head lifted proudly. It watched Yusuke just as cautiously as Yusuke watched it with its small and beady eyes.

Then, quietly, almost magically, it began to snow around them.

Yusuke straightened up.

There was a bark in the distance, a weak bay, and a cry of victory from not one, but several men. Yusuke’s attention snapped to where the sounds had come from, further in the forest somewhere to the east. His gaze turned to the white deer again. Suddenly, a great feeling of dread overcame him for the beautiful creature. Suddenly, he knew what was going on and why this deer was here.

And though he will never be fully able to explain why or how, when Yusuke then spoke to the white deer, somehow, it seemed to understand.

“You should go,” he told it, lowering his voice and hoping his urgency came across even though it was so quiet. “Quickly now, before they can catch you.” Before they can snatch such a wonderful creature such as yourself—“You need to _go…!_ ”

The deer dipped its head. Then, to Yusuke’s relief, it rose and turned to flee.

Yusuke had a single moment of breathless wonder and excitement as the proud creature actually seemed to _listen_ to him, but then all of that joy left him just as quickly as it came when the deer’s flight not only startled _him,_ but also his _horse._

Well.

Perhaps it was just as well that Yusuke had no experience riding and had no way to safely bring his once-again frightened steed to a stop. After all, if he had, he might never have met the prince.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I read somewhere that there's a story in the Shinto religion about a white deer arriving at a shrine as a divine messenger. I thought it was appropriate to throw that in in place of the traditional stag. 
> 
> Also, I'm enjoying trying to throw in as many allusions as possible to the different Cinderella incarnations that have been made throughout the years. 
> 
> And alas, forgive me, but _next chap_ we meet our prince for sure.


	3. So This is Love

It was strange, the way Akira Sakura met Yusuke Kitagawa.

His hunting party had just caught quite a few deer in their pit trap, and he himself was still floating on the exciting high that came with such a successful hunt, when he heard in the distance the sound of rapid-fire hoofbeats and a voice, crying out, “Please slow down…! Easy, now, easy—!”

He turned quickly, his eyes spotting a grey horse dashing through the leafless trees with an uncertain person splayed upon the steed’s back. His first thought was, _Well, that’s an interesting riding position,_ before he realized the said stranger wasn’t riding with any gear at all. His second thought was, _They’re in trouble!_ And his third, even as he urged his horse into a quick gallop, was, _Ryuji’s not going to let me live this one down._

His highness, after all, had an awful habit of never being able to turn away someone in need.

So he hurried. It took a moment to slow the stranger’s horse down—particularly without any reins with which to pull on—and in the snow, going at such fast speeds, it was hard to see and navigate around the trees in their way—but eventually, they came into a small clearing and there, Akira successfully grabbed a hold of the horse’s mane. With it, he managed to ease both of their horses down to a gentle halt.

“Are you all right?” he asked the stranger, quietly gathering his breath back. He straightened up in his saddle and looked to the young man he just saved.

The stranger seemed as breathless as he was, if not more. His blue-black hair was disheveled, his _haori_ and _kimono_ and _hakama_ all rumpled around his lithe form. He wasn’t even wearing shoes, just socks which were terribly muddy and soaked through from what Akira could see.

But his eyes and that face—

Despite himself, Akira’s heart stuttered just a bit when the young man finally turned to him.

He had not been prepared for quite _that_ shade of bright, ocean blue.

“Yes, I’m fine,” the stranger said. He tottered on his horse a little bit, readjusting his weight. “Thank you for your help, but I’m afraid it’s misplaced. You could have killed him…!”

Akira blinked yet again. His horse shifted. “’Him?’” he found himself repeating.

“Yes, him…!” the stranger confirmed, lit with a passion that Akira couldn’t fathom, but found himself drawn to anyway. “The white deer! Did you not see it?”

Akira didn’t know what to say to that; caught in disbelief, a small smile worked its way onto his face and he tried very hard not to laugh. He shook his head and so did the stranger, who looked away. The snow dotted the young man’s dark hair like little stars against the backdrop of a night sky. “Just as well, I suppose. It would be truly awful to see such a beautiful creature taken and killed.”

Akira didn’t know what to say to that either. “I’m…sorry?”

“As well you should be!” the man’s gaze turned to him again, and Akira found himself almost… _enjoying_ this, this banter. “What’s he ever done to you to cause you to chase him about?”

“Well, I don’t think I’ve met him before,” Akira confessed, amused smile still wide on his face. “Why? Is he a friend of yours?”

The stranger made a small sound of surprise. “W-well, _no_ , but—“

And there it was. Akira couldn’t help but let out a chuckle, the happy laughter bubbling too much inside. The stranger’s cheeks flushed, a nice color to the pallor of his elegant face. But he didn’t seem uncomfortable. If Akira looked closely enough, he could see a small and timid smile peeking out at the corners of the stranger’s mouth. It was rather endearing.

What a wonderful person, to be so concerned with the wellbeing of a forest creature.

“What’s your name?” Akira asked.

The young man hesitated for a moment, and then something in his form seemed to sadden. He shook his head. “It’s not important.” But his eyes did turn to Akira’s own again, something curious arising within their depths. “What of you? What’s your name?”

Akira’s eyebrows raised. “You don’t know who I am?” was the first thing out of his mouth.

He quickly cleared his throat and bowed his head, lifting a hand to twirl a random lock of curly black hair. “I mean, um.”

Well, what was he to say now?

“Akira,” he finally muttered. He knew it was rare to introduce yourself with your first name instead of your last—perhaps it made him too vulnerable—but if he had told the young man his family name, surely the stranger would have recognized the royal house, even if he didn’t recognize his face. And there was something about that, something about having this young man know him for being _Akira_ rather than being a _Sakura_ that he wanted to hang on to. That he wanted to cherish.

“Akira’s my name,” he reiterated and he looked to the stranger’s unblinking gaze. His hand fell back to the reins.

The stranger smiled, soft, sweet, and pleasant. “Akira,” he repeated, as if tasting it, and Akira would be lying if he said that didn’t _do_ something to him. His heart fluttered hard in his chest. “Tell me, where do you live, Akira-san?”

“At the castle.” Again, Akira found himself mentally scrambling for an answer that wouldn’t give away his heritage. “My…father’s there. He’s teaching me his trade.”

The stranger’s eyes lit up. “You’re an apprentice!” he gasped.

Once again, Akira didn’t know what to say.

“Of a sort,” he supposed.

“I know quite a few apprentices,” the stranger hummed, voice soft and distant, somehow. “It’s a very fine job. Do they treat you well?”

At that, Akira chuckled humbly. He dipped his head. “Yeah, I guess,” he murmured. He looked to the young man, and for whatever reason, something in his countenance made him ask the same question in turn. “And you? Do…’they’ treat you well?”

The hesitation before the young man spoke was just a _fraction_ of a second too long.

“As well as I deserve, I think,” came the small answer, and Akira didn’t know how to take that.

There was the sound of hoofbeats against snow and the whinny of a few horses. Suddenly, Akira and this mysterious, handsome stranger were no longer alone in their little clearing of the forest. Akira turned to see who had joined them, just as the captain of his guard called, “Yo, _there_ you are, your hi—“

“—it’s _Akira_!” he corrected quickly, grabbing the reins of his horse to turn them around as he gave Ryuji Sakamoto a quick look. “Akira! My name’s Akira!”

The blonde blinked. And then slowly, something like rotten, smug amusement spread across his face. “ _Ohhhh_ okay.” The captain turned to his lieutenant to his right, and gave an exaggerated wink. “ _Gotcha_.”

Makoto Niijima rolled her eyes, but even she, too, was smiling knowingly.

Oh, Ryuji was _definitely_ not going to let him live this one down.

“We better start headin’ back _, Akira_.” Just the tone in Ryuji’s _voice_ was so damn proud and smug. Damnit. “After all, this deer ain’t gonna skin itself.”

Akira sighed.

The stranger, smiling in that small and quiet way once again, gently urged him on. “You should go. Though I thank you, once again, for your help. I do believe I’ll be able to make it back home all right.”

Akira turned to him in a silent question of, _Are you sure?_ He wouldn’t have minded a few more minutes in his company. But when the young man nodded again, he supposed that was that. Akira nodded and turned his horse away to rejoin his friends—when suddenly, the stranger stopped him.

“Oh, and Akira-san.”

The prince turned quickly, his head snapping around. “Yeah?”

“If you do happen to see that white deer, then please. Would you be kind enough to grant him mercy?”

Akira felt something melt inside of himself. “Can I ask why?”

The stranger shook his head. His horse must have been getting antsy, it fidgeted in the snow. “It seems extraordinarily sad to me if a creature such as that doesn’t get the chance to do something great with his life. I think…I think we should get into the habit of showing a bit more kindness now and then—maybe even than what is necessary.”

Akira watched the young man raise his eyes to his.

Slowly, he found himself nodding. “Yeah…yeah, okay. Sure.”

Hope lit in those incredibly blue eyes. Had he really expected him to say no? “Oh, wait, truly? You’ll let him live?”

“Yeah. I think I will.”

Akira’s answer seemed to soothe something deep inside the stranger. He sighed and with it, all the tension in him immediately faded away. “Thank you,” he murmured.

Akira nodded.

And this time, as he turned away, the stranger didn’t stop him. But as Akira reached Ryuji and Makoto, both still extremely and annoyingly _smug_ —he turned back to see the young man still watching him. He felt something within him stir. “Think I’ll get the chance to see you again?” he called.

The young man flushed a little. “Well, if you do, I believe that’s a sign you might have too much time on your hands.”

Akira chuckled again. Ryuji snorted and Makoto ushered him to turn both of their horses away.

“Leave that for me to decide,” he answered.

And with that, Akira turned his horse to follow after his two guardsmen, something light and airy and hopeful warming in his chest, despite the winter chill.

* * *

_Leave that for me to decide._

Yusuke smiled to himself in his solitude, bowing his head. A miraculous thing, really, because when was the last time he actually _smiled_? How did that young man—Akira— _do_ that?

But he couldn’t help it. Something within him, something he didn’t know existed, felt like it had suddenly come alive during that encounter. For one beautiful moment, the world wasn’t shrouded in grey; it wasn’t heavy. It had color and it was light.

And the strangest thing was, Yusuke found that he wasn’t afraid anymore to return to Madarame’s, after all was said and done.

He wasn’t even quite sure what he was thinking when he first grabbed a horse and tried to run. It had been pain and hurt, a twisting, awful thing in his gut because why, oh why was he even alive if he was better off erased? But it occurred to him now, that somewhere in the midst of meeting the apprentice named Akira and hearing those words—“Leave that for me to decide”—he…supposed maybe he could give it another try.

He could give the estate one more day, could he not?       

After all, when was the last time he had spoken to someone? Yusuke was ashamed to admit he was a bit of a recluse in Madarame’s household. He had gotten too used to having his own little attic space and own little refuge away from his master. He hadn’t even thought to try and reach out and get to know the apprentices under Madarame’s tutelage.

Yusuke couldn’t help but think that if all apprentices were as kind and friendly as the one he had just met, then well, he had been definitely doing himself a disservice by closing in on himself and not opening up to people.

That would change, he thought.

 _He_ would change.

And maybe, just maybe, that would make his home just a little more bright.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm trying _not_ to rely too much on the 2015 Cinderella live-action movie I adore, but I can't help it. There are some scenes too good to pass up.
> 
> Also, Akira's last name isn't "Kurusu" in this fic, if you couldn't tell. Guess who that makes the _King_ then. Wink wonk.


	4. The Prince is Giving a Ball

“Well, _someone’s_ being quieter than usual.”

If it was anyone’s voice who could break through the silence and also successfully jar Akira from his thoughts, he supposed it would be Futaba’s.

Akira raised his eyes to his sister sitting across from him, on the other side of their father. Her knees were pulled up to her chest, her green and gold-lined _kimono_ folded over her form. She looked distinctly cheeky today, though Akira couldn’t place why.

The young, raven-haired man shrugged and bowed his head, fingers coming up to twirl a stray hair.

“What should I talk about?” he asked.

The king’s eyes turned from the wall. He tried to keep as still as possible for the woman next to him, holding his wrist and listening intently to the patter of his heart. He frowned softly. “You know, Akira, you don’t have to stay for this. If you have something else to do—“

Akira shook his head. His hand fell back to his lap over his thighs. “No,” he murmured. That was out of the question. He knew he would rather be here by his father’s side as they awaited the news of his health rather than anywhere else in their lands right now. No contest.

It was why Futaba was there, as well; probably the only reason, else the girl would have scampered off to her room again.

She never did like doctors.

“Ah-ha~.”

Akira blinked and looked to Futaba again as something gleeful spread over her features. Slowly, very cat-like, she began to grin. “I know what you’re thinking about…!” she practically sang. Her arms tightened around her bunched up legs.

Akira had to fight off a small thrill of fear.

“I doubt that,” he muttered in response, quietly, bowing his head and hoping no one could see the flush that had arisen to his cheeks.

Futaba cackled in her own, scary way. She rolled back on her rear and forward again, curling her socked feet around one another as she asked, “Oh ye of little faith. Don’t you know that _I_ know everything?” And with that comment, she winked. “It’s that _boy_ isn’t it? The one from the forest—“

Akira’s gaze snapped up.

Futaba’s grin had become all teeth.

How did she—?

“Ryuji,” Akira breathed. The traitor.

Futaba’s grin only widened.

Sojiro frowned. The doctor’s hand moved from his wrist to his neck, tilting his head up slightly to apply gentle, exploratory pressure under his jaw. “Boy? What’s this I hear about a boy?”

Before Akira could stop her, Futaba turned to their father the king, and announced proudly and laughingly, “Why, don’t you know, Sojiro? Akira’s _head’s_ been turned!” And then, with a few more giggles and snorts, Futaba waved a hand at the doctor attending to the king. “Hey doc, I think you’d better check out my brother, too, while you’re here—I think his neck’s probably straining!”

Akira’s face reddened deeply. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Futaba cackled again.

Sojiro merely sighed. “Akira…”

And Akira knew that tone of voice. His fingers tightened against his knees. He looked to the king, and the king looked back at him with all the wonderful and terrible age and wisdom being a ruler for so many years has granted him. In that moment, perhaps more than he had before, Akira could see the exhaustion that lined his father’s features—exhaustion that made him weaker every day.

“I know,” Akira murmured. His voice was softer, subdued, and with it, Futaba’s smile waned. “I know.”

They were words that had been spoken many times before.

_Nothing can come of it. I’m sorry, Akira._

_The kingdom needs an heir!_

_You need to focus on finding yourself a_ princess _. At the very least, find some noble’s daughter who could provide an advantageous alliance. That would give our people the comfort they desperately need for a secure future._

Futaba frowned. Akira could feel her gaze on his head, though he wasn’t sure if he wanted to look her way and see what those amber eyes were saying.

“It’s not fair,” he heard her mumble quietly.

“No, it’s not,” agreed Sojiro. The doctor removed her hands and began to gather her things. “But that’s part of life. We need to be ready to do what we have to do. And sometimes that means not getting what we want.”

Futaba’s frown deepened. She looked to their father and asked the same thought Akira had, “Yeah, but, for the rest of your _life_?”

“Futaba—“

Akira’s comment was cut off as the doctor turned to them. All three members of the royal household stiffened; their eyes ready and waiting. But the look on the woman’s pale face spoke volumes of whatever it was she was going to say.

“That bad, huh, Takemi…?” Sojiro murmured.

The doctor’s voice died on its way out. “Your highness….”

The king shook his head. “No, it’s all right. We knew it was coming, one way or another.” He sighed and with it, the air grew heavy with suspended grief. Sojiro looked to the floorboards beneath them for a moment, before he lifted his head. He glanced between both prince and princess before placing his hands on his knees and then pushing himself to a stand. Akira and Futaba raised to their feet instantly, hands outstretched and ready to help him or catch him if need be. Sojiro waved them away.

“I’m _fine_ , you worry-warts,” he muttered with a chiding smile. He walked forward and gently looped an arm around each of their shoulders, bringing them into his sides. He squeezed them close once, and then released them.

“Now, come on,” he bid. “I don’t know about you two, but I’m in the mood for some coffee right about now.”

Futaba rolled her eyes. “You’re _always_ in the mood for some coffee.”

“And why shouldn’t I be? Coffee boosts your longevity, you know.”

Behind their father’s back, Futaba and Akira shared a fond—and knowing—look.

“Yeah,” Akira muttered, his gaze returning to Sojiro. “Okay. Coffee sounds good.”

* * *

A swing and a clash. The chime of two sharp metals colliding with each other reverberated throughout the snowed courtyard. Pants of breath puffed white into the air between the two fighters as they twirled and sparred. A parry here; a quick block there. They were graceful and coordinated, moving against each other with a fluidity that can only come from knowing the other for years upon years.

The match was over far too fast.

Ryuji Sakamoto grinned widely as the end of his practice sword rested against the prince’s shoulder. He tapped it there once, twice, letting each other catch their breath before he removed it. He stuck his sword in the ground and began to massage feeling back into his left knee. “Geez. That’s the third time already. You sure you’re feelin’ okay, Akira? You’ve been like, spacing out. All day.”

Akira sighed and walked to the nearby steps leading to the covered wooden walkway surrounding the small garden. He grabbed the prone sheath for his practice sword. “Yeah. I’m sure.” He turned to his guard captain. Concern tightened his brow. “And you? How’s the leg?”

Ryuji straightened up and kicked it out. “Eh. It’s fine. Nothin’ I can’t handle.” He looked up with a brave smile.

Akira brought over his friend’s sheath, and Ryuji took it with a thanks. He watched the blonde for a moment more. Then, the prince found himself muttering quietly, “The war was pretty hard on us all, wasn’t it?”

Ryuji’s head jerked up. Brown eyes were wide with surprise one moment, before zeroing in with full attention. “Uh, yeah, I guess.” He straightened up. He shook his left leg out again as if that movement could shake out the memories that had caused his injury. “Why are you bringin’ that up?”

Akira’s dark eyes flickered upward briefly to meet his friend’s gaze. He looked back down and shifted. “Nothing. Just thinking.”

Ryuji watched his friend a moment more. He nodded, repeating the words himself. “Thinkin’, huh…?” And then, slowly, almost knowingly, he felt a smile curl onto his face. He crossed his arms over his chest. “Thinkin’…’bout what?”

Akira’s gaze snapped up. He reached up a hand to twirl a loose piece of hair. He turned around. “Nothing.”

“Nuh _-uh_ —I know _that_ look—you’re thinkin’ of _somethin’_ —“

“Ryuji, I was doing nothing of the sort,” Akira said, almost painstakingly patient as he started walking away. A smile was in his own voice—a smile Ryuji could see the instant he hurried to the prince’s side and looped an arm snug around his friend’s shoulders. It was a kind of familiarity that he wouldn’t dare show with a member of the royal household unless it was just in the comfort of their shared solitude.

He walked with him, humming. “Uh-huh, _sure._ ” Ryuji’s grin was a mile wide. “So, what is it, then? What’s the plan?”

Akira scoffed. “Plan?”

“The plan to see that one guy again. Because you and I _both_ know that’s what you’re up to in that quiet head of yours.” Ryuji gave him a squeeze and leaned in, practically hanging over the prince’s shoulder as they walked into the castle. “So how ‘bout it? Whatcha plannin’, your highness?”

The dark-haired young man’s smile widened in turn. He bowed his head. “The _war_ , Ryuji. It’s because of the _war._ ”

“Uh-huh, sure…”

Akira shook his head and looked away. “I was thinking it might be nice to…celebrate, you know? Invite everyone in the kingdom over to the palace. Let them eat, dance, and forget about the hardships this war has brought us—just for a little bit.”

Ryuji’s form gentled, and his arm slipped from Akira’s shoulders—but not before patting his back. “So…kinda like a party, yeah? I like it. It’s real nice, Akira.”

“Thanks,” Akira smiled and looked to his friend. After a moment, his mouth turned into a thin line and he turned his eyes forward with a heavy sigh. “Though there’s no telling what the king and his cabinet will make of it. They’ll probably try to frame it as an invite for other regional nobility and royalty…”

“Again?” Ryuji asked. His face tightened into a frown. “They’re really trying to marry you off, huh?”

Akira shrugged and didn’t have the heart to tell his best friend that he understood it. He got it—the urgency with which the king and his advisors were acting to try and secure the kingdom’s future. That was the only reason they were pushing so hard for Akira to find some girl to marry:  who knew how soon it would be until Sojiro wouldn’t be around anymore, and until the crown would fall to his eldest? Who knew how soon it would be until people greeted him as king instead of just a prince?

Ryuji sighed. “Well, for what it’s worth,” he murmured, “I think a party for the whole kingdom sounds great. And yknow, if Shido or the others start bitchin’ about it, then you can just tell them they gotta deal with _me_ , okay?”

The corner of Akira’s mouth curved upward. He looked to his best friend, a well of fondness swelling up in him. “Thanks, Ryuji.”

Ryuji shrugged. “Yeah. Don’t mention it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you know that if you try to Google, "Did feudal Japan have balls?" you will not find the answer you're looking for.


	5. Impossible

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Warning: Verbal/Mental/Emotional Abuse and Manipulation.**
> 
>  
> 
> [sighs and changes the amount of chapters yet again]

The proclamation went throughout the land over the next few days, with great buzz and fervor:  the prince was throwing a grand celebration, and _everyone_ —yes, _everyone_ —in the kingdom was invited.

It was all the apprentices at Madarame’s estate would speak about with hushed and excited voices, bent over the space between their seats to whisper to each other when their teacher wasn’t looking. Some of the youngest dared to giggle and ask Yusuke about what his plans were the evening of the castle party, to which the young man bowed his head and enigmatically answered around a wide smile, “Oh, nothing of import.”

But his ears burned with every whisper. He felt too afraid to dare hope, yet his heart betrayed him anyway. The traitorous thing fluttered excitedly at each mention of the upcoming party. The celebration was at the _palace_ , after all _—_ and the palace was where Akira said he was. If Yusuke went, would he see him again?

And then, an even more terrifying and fascinating thought:  what if he did?

What if he saw the young apprentice at the celebration? Would the man remember him? Would they talk and enjoy each other’s company like they did in the forest a few weeks ago?

Yusuke supposed it should have been strange but, for whatever short meeting their encounter had been, he found that moment ingrained in his memory. It sat snugly and warmly alongside with all the other happy ones he had of his mother when she was still alive. It had been such a brief conversation; it was over so fast. Surely it meant far less for the young, dark-haired man who was surrounded by friends and a promising career than it did to _him—_ a lowly servant boy better forgotten than remembered.

And yet—and _yet—_ Yusuke hoped.

Perhaps recklessly so.

_If I saw him, could I make him laugh again?_

Akira had such a very nice laugh.

The daydreams filled Yusuke with a dangerously light and airy sensation that stayed with him every quiet moment.

More than before, he found himself sketching endlessly late into the night in his little attic above the stables. He couldn’t stop himself. The happy delights he felt singing within his own bones just _cried out_ to exist in some form, even if it was by his own meager hand. When there was no paper to spare from the day’s work, he started sketching into the woodwork around him, unable to stop. Little images here and there began to sprout up, surrounding the nook he called home. Abstract swirls of hastily mixed paint from whatever scraps left over from the studio he could get his hands on swept across dirtied planks. Slowly, life was being given to what before had been empty and nothing.

If Yusuke was honest with himself, some part of him felt encouraged by it. He couldn’t help but think:  if a dingy attic above stables could become a bright and vibrant place happy to call home, who is to say the same couldn’t happen with him, inside of himself?

Yusuke—the bright and happy home.

And maybe even one day, Yusuke, the bright and happy home—for someone else, too.

It was a nice thought.

He liked painting his little attic around him. He enjoyed decorating his walls and lightening up the place. Somehow, when Yusuke stood up to look around at his crudely-drawn art—however amateurish—that covered his walls and every spare place he could reach—it reminded him of his mother.

He thought she might be proud.

The weeks before the celebration, Yusuke found himself painting lots of yellow. Plenty of bright sunshine and happy rays; lots of white and yellow camellias.

* * *

The day came when someone dared to ask Madarame, “Sensei, could we have the evening of the celebration off?” and Yusuke thought his heart would very well beat out of his chest.

The entire room of students fell silent. Yusuke stopped sweeping in the corner.

All of their eyes fell upon Madarame as he turned. His gaze slowly swept over the expectant faces of his pupils, his mouth drawn into a thin line. “Who asked that?” he said quietly.

A young man whose hair fell in a soft bowl over his brow raised his hand. “I-I did, Sensei.”

Madarame tsked softly. He shook his head with a small sigh and clasped his hands behind his back. When he finally did speak, it was gently and quietly. “Well, I…suppose it is as good a time as any for everyone to enjoy themselves.”

Gasps of excitement burst across the room.

Madarame was quick to hold up a hand. “However, _however,_ ” he chided, and the buzzes reluctantly quieted. “I would hate for the celebration to distract you all from your studies. Before you leave that evening, you must present to me one finished work worthy of my name. Then I will let you attend.”

The young man who had first pressed the question piped up again, his hand shooting into the air quickly. “Sensei, _anyone_ can go, right? So long as we finish a piece for you?”

Amusement crossed Madarame’s face. His hands clasped behind his back again. “Yes, Natsuhiko. So long as I have from you a glorious representation of all you have learned—I find no reason why you all should not go and enjoy yourselves for just one evening out of the many you spend here.”

Yusuke could not believe his ears.

….’anyone’…?

He clutched the broom stick close to him, feeling in the palms of his hands his own rapid heartbeat. The room erupted in cheers, and Yusuke turned away to the wall. Could it be true? Did Madarame really just say—?

It occurred to Yusuke that if he wanted to go, well, it would seem he had a lot of work to do.

* * *

The weeks leading up to the celebration flew by in a mix of work and frenzied painting. More than ever before, Yusuke found himself at once both inspired and completely stumped as to what he should create. It was a vicious back and forth between hope that he would be allowed to go and see that young man from the forest again and dread born from the memories of _last_ time he had tried to present Madarame with a piece of his own lackluster art.

What was it the man had said? “ _Do not mistake your place here.” “If I find you stealing my canvases and my paint again for you to try and pursue your little ‘fantasies’…you will never know my kindness again!”_

Ah, yes.

Yusuke supposed memories, in their own way, could serve as a horrible vice on the days when he _most_ wanted to paint.

But he found himself pressing on, anyway.

He wasn’t quite sure how or why. Yusuke didn’t know what determination possessed him to make him push and draw even on the days when apprehension forced his hands to stand still. When he inquired of it of himself, all he could come up with was rather simple:  there was something he wanted to do. There was some place he wanted to go.

Yusuke couldn’t help but think it would be extraordinarily sad to him if he didn’t give himself this one _chance_ to do something great with his life. To fight for _one night_ where he could pretend he wasn’t just a servant boy.

So he painted.

At the very least, if it all failed and crumbled around him, Yusuke could at least rest in the knowledge that he had _tried._

It was a poor relief for the worrying ache gnawing within him that was desperate for something good, something rewarding, something or someone to see him and his work and finally let him have just this one happy _thing—_ but it was all he had to tell himself. All he had to keep going despite the apprehensive void in his chest over and over said this was all going to be pointless.

Yusuke finished his project the day before the celebration.

* * *

“Not this again _…_ ”

Yusuke’s eyes snapped up to his master. He lowered them again and quickly. His hands remained clasped before him. He bowed once more. It was a bad start—a bad sign, when Madarame spoke like that—and he knew it, but all he could think was that maybe, just maybe, displays of respect would ease his master up to what he so desperately wished to ask. “If I can explain, Master—“

Madarame let out a deep sound somewhere between a groan and a growl.

Yusuke didn’t dare raise his eyes this time. He wondered if he should even speak. But Madarame’s silence grew longer and longer.

He kept his gaze on his master’s white socks as he continued, more humbly, “Forgive me. I had only wished to fulfill the requirement you set before everyone else for myself, as well.”

He wondered, yet again, if it was worth going on to actually voice his wish. Had he ever gotten anything he asked of Madarame? Suddenly, in that moment, Yusuke couldn’t remember. He licked his lips and his hands tightened their hold on one another.

Well. He had to _try._

“I, too, wish to participate in the festivities at the palace.”

A scoff lifted Madarame’s shoulders. He looked to the canvas he held in his hands and the picture splayed on to it—a beautiful and delicate white deer surrounded by a snowy landscape. “ _You_ intend to go to the _palace_ …?”

There was something in his voice Yusuke couldn’t describe. He couldn’t identify it as good or bad.

Madarame continued, “You want to go and stand in the same place where _royalty_ walks?”

Yusuke was quick to shake his head. He kept his head bowed, his head _bowed._ “No. I do not wish to even be seen. I only—“

But there it was again. That hesitation to voice what it was he so desperately wanted. Yusuke’s mouth ran dry.

No.

He _had_ to at least _try._  

“I only wish to see a friend of mine. He works at the palace.”

Madarame was quiet for a long spell.

“Friend?” he finally murmured. The master turned away, taking the canvas with him.

Yusuke lifted his eyes to watch him. “Yes,” he answered quietly. “I met him one day. In the forest.”

To Yusuke's surprise, Madarame laughed. His voice dipped low.

“You have no friends.”

Yusuke’s heart did a funny, tight dip.

He stared at his master, watching as Madarame continued, turning back around while still holding onto his canvas with two hands. “How could you, after all, when you’re supposed to be _working_? Or do you mean to tell me you’ve _neglected_ your duties…?” The man’s gaze hardened, as did his voice, as he asked carefully, “When did you go to the forest?”

Oh.

Perhaps he shouldn’t have mentioned that.

“I—“ Yusuke didn’t know what to say. He scrambled to think of something, anything, to appease his master before this got out of hand. Should he tell him the truth? Should he lie? What would Madarame think of him if he knew that one awful, snowy day he had tried to run away?

Madarame’s voice rose, “ _When_ did you go to the forest, Yusuke?”

Something—anything—

Yusuke shook his head. His fingernails left bent moons in his palms.

“If you won’t tell me, then I suppose I’ll just have to assume the worst, won’t I?” Madarame’s voice was strange. Angry and leveled at the same time like a caged dragon. “After all this time—I had thought of you as a diligent young man. Now, I see you’ve been off _neglecting_ us! Abandoning us for your own whims!”

Abandoning? Yusuke’s heart jumped into his throat. No, he would never abandon—

He didn’t finish that thought.

No.

The truth was, he would abandon. He did.

Nausea swooped in his stomach. He bowed again as Madarame went on. “How long has this been going on? I entrust my _food_ and my _home_ to you, and _this_ is how you repay me? By sneaking out when you have _people_ to serve and care for? By once again stealing my paints and my canvases, all to serve your own selfish purposes?”

Yusuke didn’t respond. Couldn’t.

This wasn't what he had hoped for.

“Would it _hurt_ you to actually think of _someone else_ other than your own damned self for once, Yusuke?”

“I—“

There was a strange and hollow void opening up in Yusuke’s stomach again. For a moment, he wondered if he bowed low enough, if he could just become one with the floorboards underneath Madarame’s feet.

It seemed a more fitting place for him than standing and living and breathing.

“No.” Madarame’s harsh, low voice was punctuated by the snapping of wood and the ripping of cloth. Yusuke didn’t dare look up; he didn’t need to. The broken, splintered canvas he had used was thrown at his feet. “Don’t speak. I know what you’re going to say, you stupid fool.”

He was right.

He was stupid, wasn't he? 

How foolish of him.

“You aren’t sorry.”

Madarame turned and walked away.

Yusuke slipped to his knees.


	6. It's Possible

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I haven't been here for a year. I don't know if I even have business posting for this fandom anymore, but I started watching the P5 Animation recently (AND AM LOVING. IT.) and thus, fell back into my love for the game.
> 
> So guess what fic I've returned to.
> 
> Also, because this fic is, again, _a year old_ Akira's name is still Akira because that's what it was back in ye olde game days. I have to admit though, I do like his new name, Ren Amamiya. But alas. This is an old work. So I'm working with what I had and still got. Y'know. But all that's changeable if you guys want.
> 
> Also, special thanks to everyone who's reviewed and been so supportive even while this thing hasn't been updated in, again, _a year_. You guys are the real heroes. I read every word you left and each time was super, super touched. 
> 
> You're the real reason this fic is back. 
> 
> Welcome back.

The night was cold and dark, but time marched on.

Silently and slowly, Yusuke disposed of the ruined canvas. His movements ached; his footsteps were heavy. He rubbed at his running nose until it was as red as his eyes. He was on his way to leave the main building of the estate to head for his attic, but it was then he saw him.

One of Madarame’s students, still working away late into the night by candlelight.

He stopped. He wondered if he should approach, but Yusuke found his feet made the decision for him. They pulled him into the dim room and closer to the young man diligently working.

He recognized this student. The bowl-haired one who had raised his hand to first ask of their master if the students could attend the palace celebration.

Natsuhiko, Madarame had addressed him as.

Yusuke cleared his throat when he was close. The young man jumped and spun around, eyes wide.

Yusuke clasped his hands together and bowed. “I apologize for interrupting,” he said. His voice felt so hoarse and rough coming out of his ragged throat. The corners of his eyes were still crusty from before. He resisted the urge to pick and wipe them clean. “But you should retire, sir. The sun has long since set.”

Natsuhiko sighed. He shook his head and turned away to look at the canvas before him. “I know, I know.” But he didn’t pull his brush away from the canvas.

Yusuke let his eyes roam across the painting’s surface. It was...good. The tranquility of rainfall; the greyed deep blues in the background contrasted with the purples of the budding lotus flower at the front corner. Its bulbous, bowed head was slowly unfurling, like its petals were reaching out for the rain. It knew what it needed to grow.

“That’s a lovely piece,” he breathed. His lungs hitched a strange breath.

Natsuhiko shook his head. “It’s not _good_ enough,” he griped quietly. He bowed his head over his palette and dipped his brush into the ceramic bowl of water by his bent knees. The brush’s strands slid through more green and were swirled for deeper shades. “Madarame rejected my first piece. I don’t know if its just because he doesn’t want me to go to the ball, but…” The young man sucked in a sharp breath through gritted teeth. “I’m the only one who hasn’t been approved. I _have_ to make this one work. I _want_ to _go._  I don’t want to be left behind!”

That made two of them.

Yusuke pressed his lips together and watched Natsuhiko struggle with his shading. There were dark bags underneath the student’s eyes; an obvious strain in the lining of his brow. It ached to see another like this. How long had Natsuhiko been here, hard at work? How long had he been trying, and trying, and trying, just to be approved--

Natsuhiko hissed a breath and yanked his brush away from the canvas. “No…!” he groaned and dropped his palette and brush to the side. He snatched the rag at the base of his easel and dabbed at a stroke that had gone too far. “No, no, _no_ …”

Yusuke wrapped his fingers around the wrist holding the rag. “Rest,” he murmured. Natsuhiko’s breath shook in his lungs; the poor young man was exhausted. “I will finish it for you.”

“ _You_ ?” Natsuhiko’s beady black eyes flashed. They snapped to Yusuke’s own; his nostrils flared. “What do _you_ know about art?”

Yusuke opened his mouth and nothing came out.

“Unhand me.”

Yusuke’s hand withdrew to himself quickly, as if burned.

For a moment, Natsuhiko just breathed. He stared at Yusuke and then turned back to his painting. His rag dropped to the floor. “...sorry. I’m sorry. Maybe you’re right,” he muttered, his voice muffled through his hands running over his face. “I can’t...I can’t do anymore.”

“Rest,” Yusuke repeated. “Everything will be all right.”

Natsuhiko chuckled; a quiet and barren sound. “...empty platitudes.” But he nodded. He ran a hand across his forehead and pushed himself to a stand. “Yes. I’ll...I’ll call it.”

Yusuke bowed to him as the student stepped around him. He didn’t raise his head until he could hear the quiet slide of Natsuhiko’s _tabi-_ socked feet at the sliding door to the room. Yusuke bent to pick up the brush and palette, reaching again to pick up the water bowl as well, but he could hear Natsuhiko’s footsteps pause. He froze as the young man spoke.

“You know, if...if you want to finish it, go ahead,” Natsuhiko murmured. “It’s not like I have a chance in hell, anyway. What harm can a servant boy do?”

He waited and then after a swollen pause, left.

Yusuke stared at the near-finished canvas.

When he finally knelt before the painting and placed the bowl back to the wooden floor, he picked up the palette and chose a pale yellow.

* * *

The next day came and seemed like it would go just as quickly.

There were no art lessons; no open studio hours. No actual painting to be done. Only mad scrambling as the students readied themselves for the celebration as well as the approved art pieces for showcasing during the actual event.

Yusuke supposed he should have been glad that Natsuhiko’s finished work was among them.

He didn’t get a chance to speak to the bowl-haired boy, but there was a moment--a fleeting glance of wide, grateful ebony eyes in the middle of the frantic dressing and grooming of several excited young men and women--but the servant boy supposed that would be enough.

Yusuke went everywhere he was asked, helping anyone he could. He brushed back hair, washed clothes, stitched hems, provided finishing touches on masks, and carefully applied cosmetics more times than he could count. His stomach churned in jealous knots every hour, but the Work kept him from focusing too much on it.

Madarame was silent when he pulled back the man’s greying hair and tied it in a high tail. He didn’t say anything and stared resolutely forward as Yusuke helped him slip first into his silk _kimono_ and then his shimmering _bakama._ He laid over his master’s shoulders the long, gold-lined _haori_ and dusted his shoulders off. Applying the last touch, his cosmetics, was perhaps the one part of his dressing Yusuke was glad for his silence:  the lines above his eyes and the small dip of red to the center of his lips would be so much harder to put on should Madarame try to speak. When he was finished, he handed his master the simple white mask to string over his features.

Madarame took one look at the mask and set it to the side. “I have no reason to hide,” he muttered.

Yusuke bowed his head.

Like a whirlwind, the time for the students and their master to depart for the castle came and Yusuke watched on the frosted front stoop as they broke into groups and boarded the several covered _zagyoshiki_ waiting and already loaded with the covered artworks that were to be on display during the festivities. The coachmen called for their horses to ride. Then, like a modest procession, the train of carriages marched towards the setting sun.

Yusuke was alone.

He wrapped his _haori_ around his shoulders and turned for the main estate. There was a load of laundry he should attend to. Lots of dusting he could probably fill his time with.

The list of chores grew longer the more he thought about it, and more and more detailed. He wrapped his mind up with the thought of busywork; hunching his shoulders and hugging himself as he made his way to the backyard. He lifted the hamper of students’ clothes waiting just before the door and rested it against his hip. With his foot, he nudged open the back panel to the outside and stepped out.

He was so, so terribly lost in thought, he didn’t notice the small, black cat perched on the back porch and watching his every move.

Yusuke set the basket of laundry beside the empty wooden basin and lifted off its snow-dusted lid. He would need to fetch the water he already had warming above the fire in the kitchen, as well that bar of soap from the _jokamachi_. He gingerly sighed and straightened. When he turned, he nearly jumped out of his skin when he felt something furry wriggling against his leg.

An undignified yelp leapt from his throat and he stumbled, tripping, and he heard an equally-as-startled cry of, “ _Mrow!”_ as the creature lept to the lip of the basin.

Yusuke fell to the frozen earth, pushing himself to sit upright by his hands.

The black cat hissed, tail fluffed, and head crouched low as it scolded him for nearly stepping on it. Yusuke blinked and breathed.

“Oh.”

The cat blinked back. Its white-tipped tail flicked left, then right, like an upside-down pendulum. Its ice blue eyes were agitated, glowering, and somehow, Yusuke found himself chuckling. “I must apologize. It appears you have frightened me as much as I frightened you.”

The cat didn’t answer. Yusuke almost could’ve sworn it was frowning at him.

He pushed himself to his feet and dusted his _hakama_ off. “I digress,” he sighed and the sound was long and heavy. He lifted his gaze to the cat; it was rather thin and its midnight coat was mangy, knotted; the once-white boots of its paws were muddied and crusted, like it had been on its own for several days.

Yusuke hummed a single note to himself in thought.

“Well. I haven’t others to serve or care for tonight, and I’m not quite sure I know what to do with myself in an empty house. How about you? You seem like you could do with a meal and a warm bath. Should I...further misuse my Master’s food and home to extend my care to you, little stray?”

The cat blinked and flicked its tail once more.

Yusuke wondered if he was imagining the way it seemed to understand him. “Hmm. Yes, I would agree,” he murmured with a smile and he reached out to brush his fingers across the cat’s brow before he turned for the house.

A moment later, he returned with a bowl of milk and his own hairbrush and as soon as he set the bowl to the dirt, the cat hopped to the ground. It bent its head and licked and Yusuke couldn’t help but smile. He let his fingers run against the cat’s back, following the slope of its knobby spine to its tail. The cat lifted its flank into his touch and he chuckled.

“You, my friend, are in need of a _bath_ ,” he murmured.

All at once, the cat snapped its head up from the bowl to huff at him. “ _Rude_!”

Yusuke stared.

The cat glared back.

And as his mind screamed with warning bells, _Bakeneko! Bakeneko!,_ his mouth flapped to form other weak and uncertain words, “...I beg your pardon?”


	7. Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _...And because these daft and dewey-eyed dopes_  
>  _Keep building up impossible hopes_  
>  _Impossible things are happening every day!_  
>  \- "It's Possible," Rodgers and Hammerstein's _Cinderella_
> 
> (I just rather like the thought of Yusuke as a "daft and dewey-eyed dope." Don't mind me.)

The _bakeneko_ lowered its rump to the earth and raised a foot to scratch at its neck. Its blue eyes scrunched narrow. “Geez, I forgot how candid you humans are. I don’t _need_ a bath, idiot. I _needed_ your sympathy.” And like that, a shake started from the tip of the cat’s nose and traveled down across its body, and with it, ebony fur fluffed and shined and all at once became glossy and clean.

Yusuke gaped helplessly.

“But, congratulations. You passed. Even after harsh and persistent cruelty, you’ve proven to be more than gentle and kind. Now don’t just stand there, gawking!” The cat rose to all fours. “Get ready! We don’t have a lot of time!”

“I--I’m sorry?”

“No!” It huffed and raised its hackles. “Ugh. Don’t apologize. You want to go to the _ball_ , don’t you?”

Yusuke’s chest heaved for a long exhale. “I...yes?” He shook his head. “How is this happening? How are you--?”

“Fine, thank you. The milk was nice,” the cat answered and its lips pulled back in what might have been a cheeky smile. Its whiskers twitched. “But that’s beside the point. Chop! Chop! Get your nicest, most fanciest formal wear on, Yusuke! They’re waiting for you, you know!”

“How do you know my name?”

“Geez, you don’t stop with the questions even under a time crunch, do you?” The _bakeneko_ sneered. “Fine. To answer everything else you’re about to ask:  my name is Morgana. You already know what I am; I can see it in your eyes. And to answer something else:  I knew your mother before she passed. She was nice to me. I’m only sorry I couldn’t help her when she was sick; but now, I can help _you_. So that’s exactly what I’m going to do!”

Yusuke watched as the cat jumped back up to the lip of the basin and perched itself there proudly. Its ice eyes gleamed.

“One way or another, we’re going to get you to the castle, Yusuke. It’s already been determined!”

“But I don’t…” Yusuke shook his head, dazed. “I don’t _have_ formal wear.”

Morgana paused. Its tail flicked from side to side. “...okay,” it finally answered after a long break. “All right. Fine. Guess that just means this is going to take somethin’ a little extra, huh?”

“A little--”

“--now, what color will bring out your eyes…” Morgana hummed and leaned its head forward. Its nose twitched as it sniffed and studied its project. Finally, the _bakeneko_ nodded. “Got it. This will be a cinch!” The same cheeky lift of its small mouth preceded an excited, “Yusuke Kitagawa, how would you like to be a prince for an evening?”

“...a what?”

* * *

The magic was dazzling.

Yusuke hadn’t been aware such a thing existed. Oh, his mother had spoken of it; what mother didn’t to their child late under moonlight, curled together and reading old fairy-tales? But he had long since abandoned those notions as idle beliefs for children.

Now he stood before a _bakeneko,_ dressed somehow--incredibly--unexplainably-- _impossibly_ \--in the finest of silks his skin had never known. His long, draping _haori_ , white-collared and silver-threaded, was embroidered with small, golden clasps. Around his waist tied a navy-and-white lined sash, bringing his _bakama_ to his figure. He gazed down at himself with wonder, eyes wide and mystified. The winter chill around him couldn’t touch him at all.

“Like it?” Morgana asked. Its--no, _his_ \--voice was softer than before.

Yusuke raised his eyes to the cat sitting before him on the back porch of the estate. He swallowed. “I don’t know what to say.”

Somehow, that seemed enough to satisfy the magical creature. Morgana flicked his tail. “Well, before you go riding off into the sunset and all on your way to the celebration, do me a favor. Hold out your hands.”

Yusuke did as instructed and with sparking red lines, a striking, white-and-scarlet painted mask manifested in his palms. “...an _inari_?” he asked.

“Take it as you will,” Morgana murmured. “Everyone else is wearing masks to this thing, right? Besides, I don’t think you want Madarame or any of his other students recognizing you.” He jerked his chin towards the porcelain face of a fox. “The mask’s enchanted, just in case. They won’t know you’re you.”

Yusuke rubbed his fingertips over the cool, smooth surface. It’s subtle curves were very handsome. “I take it I can’t remove it, then? Else the spell won’t be in ‘effect’?”

“You’re catching on quick!” Morgana gave that peculiar cat-smile. His whiskers lifted. “All magic has its limits. For example:  those clothes won’t last forever. They’ll revert back to those rags you were wearing the instant it turns midnight. So, like I said, you don’t have that much time.”

Yusuke shook his head with a small smile. He lifted his eyes to Morgana’s. “No. It’s just enough.”

Morgana dipped his head then rose to all four paws again. “Now, grab a horse and _go_ , you idiot. The water clock is _literally_ ticking, in this case. So _go._ ”

Yusuke breathlessly nodded. “Thank you!” he gasped and with fingers trembling in anticipation and thrill, he slipped the mask on to sit over his brow and he ran as fast as he could for the stables. He could only hope his second time on a horse’s back would prove better than his first.

* * *

The Sakura castle was outfitted with only the finest decorations for such a winter celebration. Flowers and paper lanterns were strung up on towering wooden posts around the vast front courtyard. The air was filled with the aroma of sweet and savory delicacies lining the tables, steam wafting from heated meats and breads.

Akira pulled at the collar of his outfit on the front steps of the palace, resisting the sigh that was building under his sternum. A close friend and seamstress had personally designed his clothes for the evening, but that did not mean they were favorable. Her “Western touches” she had slipped into the designs included a close-fitting and high-necked, smokey vest under his _haori_ that held up his _bakama_ without a sash _._ Though the prince would admit:  he liked the way it brought out the slender lines of his form. The sharp slant to the shoulders of the ebony _haori_ made him appear more regal, too.

He just wondered why Ann had to make the vest so _tight._

“Lookin’ good, your highness. I always knew black was your color.”

Akira flitted his gaze to the left and rolled his eyes. Ryuji’s shock of blond hair made him easily recognizable even behind the dark steel mask of a skull. With the familiarity of years at each others’ side, the other young man strode right to his side and nudged his arm.

“Hey,” Ryuji whispered, “Seen your guy yet?”

The voices of new arrivals were continually read aloud as more and more guests started to file in. Akira mildly wondered if the castle grounds would have enough food, let alone enough space, for all these people:  Lord Yoshida this, and the Togo Family that. Sir Madarame and each of his long list of students. The post-war celebrations were going to better attended than Akira thought and he knew that should be a good thing. It should be something he was excited and happy about. Instead, all he could feel was a restless impatience.

The prince shook his head. Ryuji’s concerned gaze was warm on his profile, easily burning through the cover of his mask and reading him in a way few others could.

“Well, don’t worry about it. We’ll keep our eyes out, too,” his guard captain finally said and patted his shoulder.

“We?” Akira echoed.

Ryuji sighed. His hand fell away. “Yeah, okay, maybe just me.”

The corner of Akira’s mouth twitched upward. “Let me guess:  Ann?”

“Where else would Makoto be? Those two are the _definition_ of predictable.”

Akira chuckled. “As is Futaba.” He shook his head and his dark curls bounced. “She’s refusing to come downstairs.”

Ryuji’s voice lifted in surprise. “What? Not even to see your handsome forest boy--?”

“--Akira.”

Caught with his mouth open to rebuke his friend, Akira jumped. Both his and Ryuji’s attentions snapped to the king and the head royal advisor approaching. On their heels walked two masked but expensively distinguished guests; Akira had no doubt from the way they held themselves to their long, silken _kimonos_ that they were neighboring royalty.

The prince’s heart jumped high in his throat. He turned and with Ryuji beside him, bowed low.

“Father,” Akira murmured.

Sojiro dipped his head and stepped aside. He held out an arm in gesture to the older man and younger woman behind him. “Shido was just introducing me to these two. Allow me to present to you King Kunikazu Okumura and his daughter, Princess Haru. They are visiting from Mammon--you remember that name, don’t you? Their kingdom helped ours quite a bit in the war.”

Akira and Ryuji bowed low again. “A pleasure to meet you. We thank you for your assistance,” Akira muttered.

Kunikazu briefly bent himself in response; Haru bowed lower, a small smile on her face.

“It was an honor,” Kunikazu rumbled. Akira didn’t miss the way his eyes darted meaningfully to the head royal advisor as he spoke. “I don’t mean to trouble you further, your highness, but my daughter, Haru, has never been to your little kingdom before. We wondered if you would do her the honor of showing her around for the celebration. She’s been so looking forward to this for weeks and Shido informed us you would be the perfect guide for her.”

Ryuji whispered a knowing curse at his shoulder.

Akira didn’t need to look to know that the Head Royal Advisor’s expectant countenance looked like. Shido was so easy to read, even without giving him the courtesy of a glance.

But his father...

When Akira’s eyes flitted to that familiar, worn face, what he saw made him nod. His heart fell low to his feet. “Of course,” he muttered. He turned his gaze to the young woman so delicately wrapped in patterned pinks and purples. Her simple black mask strung across her face did nothing to hide her beauty, and the _kanzashi_ in her hair brought out the warm chestnut of her eyes. He crooked his elbow for her and with a faint flush, Haru stepped forward and tucked her small hand in its bend.

“Akira, you don’t have to--” Ryuji hissed.

But Akira shook his head and gave him a sharp look. Without another word, his guard captain fell faithfully quiet.

It did little good waiting for someone he knew he could never be with and who might not even show, rather than playing into whatever plan Shido had talked his father into. It was a plan, he knew, that was supposed to be for the betterment of the kingdom.

Akira swallowed more than just his pride and turned to Haru at his side.

“What would you like to see first?” he asked.


	8. Ten Minutes Ago

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Ten minutes ago, I saw you_   
>  _I looked up when you came through the door_   
>  _My head started reeling_   
>  _You gave me the feeling_   
>  _The room had no ceiling or floor…_

“Excuse me. Are you looking for someone?”

Akira blinked and jerked his head back around towards Haru. It was the first words she had spoken to him all evening while the steady flow of people kept coming in. The festivities would officially start soon, he knew; Shido had spoken with him a few days ago about the dances that would spearhead the evening and how important it would be to be a visible participant. Now, tied to a neighboring princess for the evening, Akira fully understood why.

He shook his head and accepted the stick of honeyed and chilled fruit Haru was sweetly holding out for him. “No.”

Haru smiled. Her voice was soft and gentle, lulling. “It’s okay to tell me the truth, if you are. This wasn’t exactly my plan, either.”

Ah.

Akira took the first bite of strawberry. “So you’re a victim of the age-old marrying-off plan, too?”

Haru giggled. “My father’s been at it for a while. Sometimes, it’s all he talks about.”

Akira sighed. _Tell me about it._ His eyes drifted again, wandering to the front of the courtyard, where it was only lit by the paper lanterns surrounding them, now that the sun had fully set.

“...can you tell me about her?” Haru murmured.

“Who?”

“This girl you’re waiting for,” Haru insisted and her smile was small but wry. Shyly teasing, even though they’d only known each other for a handful of minutes. “She must be quite the princess if she’s managed to catch and hold your attention like this.”

Akira paused with a piece of cantaloupe suspended between his teeth.

“I won’t be offended. In fact, I think I’d be relieved.” Haru shrugged with a gentle roll of her shoulders and bowed her head. “There’s less pressure on me then, y’know?”

Slowly, Akira began to chew the thawing fruit.

“I mean, I don’t mean that in a bad way! It’s not that I don’t want to marry you or that I don’t think you are handsome or anything, because you _are_.” Haru took a short breath. Her face was very, very red under her mask. “But if you’ve already got someone, then we don’t have to be forced to like each other. And I think that’s best for everyone…”

Her voice trailed off.

Akira mercifully kept eating the other honeyed fruit on the small wooden stick in his hand.

“...so...will you tell me?”

Akira turned away. Even with a mask on, he felt too exposed if she were to see his eyes. She might know his heart.

“I see,” Haru said quietly, dejectedly.

“ _Everyone, thank you for coming to tonight’s festivities! We’re so glad you could make it!”_

Akira inhaled slowly. “Don’t take my silence for some kind of...dislike or distrust,” he said carefully. “You’re very kind. I just…”

“ _This is a time of celebration for all of the people, commoners_ and _nobles, after all the hardships the war has brought upon us. This is a time to be joyful! To remember what we have.”_

Haru shook her head. A small and brave smile spread her lips. “No, it’s okay. You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to. I understand. I shouldn’t have pressed.” Her voice softened and drifted to him like a cloud, “Our hearts should be our own, after all. Shouldn’t they?”

Akira looked to her and hoped she could see the well of gratitude deep in his eyes.

* * *

“ _To begin our celebrations, we invite our prince to lead our first dance!”_

Yusuke could hear the heavy beat of _taiko_ as he hurried up the many steps towards the front palace courtyard. The stairs were completely bare of others; was he already so late? He did not recognize the welcomer’s voice, so they were not Akira. For a moment, he idly wondered if he would get the chance to see his friend from the forest display his craft--whatever it was--here at the castle. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?

“ _So please, Prince Sakura, if you would--select a partner and join us on the center grounds. And let us be joined by everyone else, too, who would like to celebrate the end of a long war.”_

His breath puffed into the chilled air as he finally crested the top of the stairs and looked down upon the wide, lit courtyard. It was so colorful, so full of life and people and different _smells_ and voices and _sounds_ that it was nearly overwhelming.

Yusuke had never seen such a grand display in his life.

His eyes scanned with fervor the cluster of milling people and their fine, glittering vestments, searching for one person among the many. One familiar head of dark, unruly, curly hair in the middle of them all. Surely he wouldn’t be too hard to pick out--

\--in the end, he should have known, they would find him first.

There was a triumphant cry that broke over the murmurings of the multitude, shouting, “Akira!”

Yusuke’s eyes snapped to the source of the yell. He recognized the curved slump of those shoulders and that abnormal, yellow hair, even with that dark skull mask on. Wasn’t he a friend of Akira’s? He saw him that fated day in the forest, as well, he’s sure.

The young man had a finger pointed in his direction, but his gaze was turned away. And when Yusuke followed his eyes to where they were pinned, his heart leapt in his chest.

* * *

A stunned silence swallowed the crowd.

Akira bowed his head and bit back an exasperated, “ _Ryuji,”_ that was dying to fall off his tongue. How many times did he need to remind him? Just because he told him to call him by his given name that _one time_ in the forest, doesn’t mean his guard captain could _always_ address him as such, especially in front of others--

But then he turned.

And his eyes followed the point of a finger.

And everything else in the world around them began to matter a whole lot less.

* * *

_…I have found him  
_ _I have found him_

* * *

Like everyone else, Haru found her attention snapped to the guard captain who had interrupted the start of the festivities. When she saw the handsome guest who had arrived, standing at the front of the courtyard, just as stunned to silence as much as everyone else--the guest who the unnaturally blonde appeared so excited to be able to identify--she turned to the prince at her side.

There was something in his eyes, in the surprise of his face. The unguarded way he _stared,_ like he had forgotten all of the walls he was supposed to keep up around himself. It was like he didn’t even have a mask on; his face and his heart were so easy to read.

At that moment, Haru realized so very many things at once.

She smiled.

She placed a gentle hand on the prince’s shoulder. As if suddenly reminded she existed, Akira’s smoke-grey gaze jerked to her. His lips snapped shut tight; she knew the apology on the tip of his tongue before it even left his mouth.

She shook her head.

“Go,” she whispered instead.

* * *

Akira dropped the stick in his hand. His heart yanked so hard at the base of his throat, like it was _pulling_ him forward. And he let it.

The crowd of visitors parted before him. It was surreal, almost magical. It was like something out of a fairytale, the way people around them just seemed to _understand_. The other guests backed far enough away to give the prince his distance, to give him the pathway he needed to reach his boy from the forest.

And when Akira stood before him, even time mercifully turned slower.

The whisper of words that rushed out of him wasn’t “ _Hello,”_ or “ _You look amazing,_ ” or even, “ _I didn’t know you, too, were a prince--!”_

Instead, all he could gasp was, “It’s you. You _came._ ”

Those ocean-blue eyes smiled at him and it was everything Akira had ever wanted.

“Of course,” the low timber of the taller man rumbled. “I wouldn’t want to miss the opportunity to see you again.”

Akira smiled. He bowed and ignored the small,surprised murmurs that rose from the watchful crowd behind them. When he straightened, he gestured with his arm to the center square of the courtyard and held his other hand out for his nameless stranger. “Would you do me the honor of joining me for the first dance tonight?”

A myriad of emotions flew through those blue eyes, quick as a flash--almost too fast for Akira to read. They darted to the square and back. “I...must apologize. You’ve caught me at an impasse; I’m afraid I don’t know how to--”

“--it’s all right.” The prince lowered his voice. “Just follow my lead.”

He watched the Adam’s apple of the other bob. The scarlet-lined face of a fox bowed.

And when those slender, long fingers slid alongside Akira’s warm ones and intertwined, they were a perfect fit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _In the arms of my love, I’m flying_  
>  _Over mountain and meadow and glen_  
>  _And I like it so well_  
>  _That for all I can tell_  
>  _I may never come down again_  
>  _I may never come down to earth again_  
>  \- “Ten Minutes Ago,” Rodgers & Hammerstein’s _Cinderella_
> 
>    
> i think this song might be my favorite off of that album???
> 
> also hi I love Ryuji "Aggressively-Abuses-the-Permission-To-Call-the-Prince-By-Name-Because-of-the-One-Time-in-the-Forest" Sakamoto and I hope you do too


	9. Do I Love You Because You're Beautiful? (Or Are You Beautiful Because I Love You?)

The _gagaku_ that played as they and the crowd around them danced was slow, easy to step into. Yusuke fell into the rhythm of the _taiko_ as it beat and the flutes that hummed a single, long note at a time. He didn’t have to look down at his feet once to worry if he would trip; he kept his palm pressed to Akira’s and mirrored his every move as they walked patiently in a circle.

Their eyes never left one another’s.

Yusuke didn’t think he ever wanted them not to.

* * *

“A _thousand_ apologies, your royal highness,” Masayoshi Shido found himself saying over and over again to a red-faced king. He bowed as low as he could. “I’m not sure what...happened.”

“I thought we had an _agreement_ ,” Kunikazu sneered.

Shido cursed hot-blooded youth entirely for this horrible turn of events. “We still do,” he assured. This was all Akira’s and that idiot guard captain of his fault. How could they be so foolish as to entrust the prince’s fascination with a complete _stranger_? He’s never seen that young man who wandered in so late before in his life and until _he_ knew his identity, that aptly-masked _fox_ was a safety hazard for the entire royal family. “I will get to the bottom of this. I promise.”

King Okumura turned away with a grim set to his mouth.

Sojiro Sakura, standing a foot away, said not a word. His eyes were fixed on the middle of the courtyard.

* * *

With one final note, the dance ended and all the participants bowed to each other. Yusuke couldn’t stop smiling.

When Akira pulled forward and took his hand again-- _his hand_ \--he didn’t think he would ever tire of that electric sensation that darted up his arm each and every time they touched--the prince murmured a low and happy, “Come with me.”

Yusuke’s gut did a funny flip. He nodded.

Akira squeezed his hand and wove through the masked crowd and away with practiced ease.

When they finally came to a stop after following a tall hedgeline of green around the back of the palace and reaching a gate, Yusuke wheezed, “You didn’t tell me you were the _prince_!”

“I’m still amazed you didn’t already know this,” Akira chuckled and fiddled with the latch on the gate door. Its metal was chilled near-frozen; his fingertips hurt to touch it. “But it’s not like you told me _you_ were a prince, either. So, we’re even.”

“I’m not--” Yusuke cut his voice off the instant a _click_ sounded from the gate door.

“Here.” Akira turned towards Yusuke and held out his hand again. His small grin was warm and inviting, just like it had been all that evening. Tempting, somehow, in that devilish way of his. “I want to show you something.”

For what felt like the thousandth time that evening, Yusuke slowly dropped his hand into the prince’s and let himself be led.

And for what felt like the thousandth-and-one time that evening, he was not disappointed.

The garden on the other side of the door was beautiful _._

It stretched long before them, following a secluded wall of the castle on the southeastern side. The frost on the many, thin birch trees at the back made them glimmer. Low-hanging branches from a large _sakura_ tree at the end of a bridge stretched across the middle shimmered with dripping icicles. Footprints had been left through the snow-covered ground and the stone benches intermittently lining the curve of the path had been dusted off--signs that this paradise here was well-loved and well-visited.

Akira guided Yusuke through the footprints and to a bench under the _sakura’s_ broad canopy. Side-by-side, they sat. Yusuke fought off a shiver at the chill of the stone underneath him. He squeezed Akira’s hand.

“Sorry,” Akira muttered with a quiet chuckle. “It’s not the most romantic--”

“--no, it’s beautiful,” Yusuke sharply answered and when their eyes met, he hoped the prince knew he meant it. “Thank you.”

The edge of Akira’s mouth rose in a happy, crooked slant. He ducked his head and reached up his free hand to twirl a loose lock of dark hair.

“I had never known gardens could look this wondrous in winter,” Yusuke found himself murmuring as his eyes swept out over the frozen land. His breath puffed before his lips in a faint white cloud. “Truly, this is an underappreciated landscape.”

“‘Landscape’?” Akira repeated with a chuckle. “You talk like an artist.”

Yusuke’s heart fluttered at the same time as his stomach swooped. He bowed his head. “Do I?”

“We have some paintings here, you know. A famous artist in the region has brought his work to showcase for our celebration. We could go see them, if you want.” Akira would gladly take this young man anywhere he wanted, if only to impress him, to make that wonder rise in his voice again. “My eyes aren’t the best and I myself can’t paint for my life, but there’s a piece of a lotus flower on display that I think is nice.”

Yusuke shook his head. “No, but thank you. Won’t they miss you in the courtyard?”

Akira shrugged a shoulder. “Maybe. But let’s not go back just yet.”

His smile was met with Yusuke’s own.

“All right.”

Their fingers, already so close and enfolded over one another, once more intertwined. Yusuke felt his heart speed up like it might buck out of his chest.

* * *

“Where _is_ he?!”

Masayoshi Shido marched through the side hall where several portraits had been put up for display, their canvases intricately painted and lined with weeks’ of hard work. He would tear them all to shreds if it would reveal where their foolhardy _prince_ had wandered off to.

Several other attendants and guards flitted around him, each of them feeding off of his panic and anger.

The prince’s guard captain at his side sighed and crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m telling you, he’s probably fine. If he’s hiding like this, it’s probably because he doesn’t _want_ to be found. Can’t you let the guy have a break?”

Shido spun on him and seethed, “ _You’re_ the reason he’s even missing. It’s your _fault_. You should have been watching him! What if there’s an attack on his life at this very moment?”

“Yeah, okay, point.” Ryuji dipped his head and shrugged. “But counterpoint:  what if he’s off having the time of his life with a really good tryst? I mean, do _you_ really want to find the prince like that? I know _I_ don’t and we’re like, best friends.”

“You’re a _fool_ ,” Shido hissed not for the first time and spun around to other guards watching them with wide eyes. “All of you! Utter fools! Find Prince Sakura! _Now_ …!”

“Why is it so important to find him, anyway?” Ryuji pushed up the skull mask over his face to rest on the crown of his head. He narrowed his eyes at the advisor who didn’t look back at him. “I swear, a minute ago, when you thought he was with Princess Haru, you didn’t care one _lick_ about where they were. But once she came back without him, you started freaking out.”

Shido’s jaw flexed with a thick swallow. “Because he was _supposed_ to be with her! That was the agreement.“

“No, it wasn’t. He only agreed to showing her around the festival and he did that.”

“He _is_ agreed to marry her, Captain Sakamoto.” Shido’s voice dropped to something dangerous and low as he turned to the blonde. “ _That’s_ what I mean when I say ‘agreement.’”

Ryuji’s blood ran cold. “Akira didn’t ‘agree’ to that.”

“He doesn’t need to. He just needs to be a good boy and play along.” Shido’s mouth downturned into a heavy and ugly frown. “But we’ve all been _cushioning_ him, going soft when we should have been _stern_. He thinks he can just give in to his childish whims and chase whoever he wants and it’s not _like_ that. It can never _be_ like that for him--”

“--and why _not_ , huh?” Ryuji burst. His fist tightened at his side. “I’m pretty sure the only one who’s saying that is _you_!”

“You foolish child--!”

“--is...everything all right, my lords?”

In retrospect, Ryuji knew he should have been glad that the elderly stranger had intervened. His fist was suspended, already on its way to doing something he know would have landed him in big trouble. But when the man spoke, immediately, his arm dropped to his side. Shido turned away to face the grey-haired and golden-wrapped elder. He dipped his head.

“Yes, Madarame, sir,” Shido murmured. “Please forgive us for disturbing the quiet of your museum.”

Ryuji wasn’t sorry. He sent one glance over his shoulder at the finely-dressed man named ‘Madarame’ and then turned back around. He didn’t have time for this.

He marched away.

* * *

“...so...you’re not _really_ an apprentice.”

“Sort of. I’m an apprentice monarch; still learning my father’s ‘trade.’”

“And is your name really ‘Akira’?”

“It is.”

“Why didn’t you tell me? That day in the forest? Surely a prince has nothing to fear.”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Akira tilted his head back and looked at the scattered stars they could see through the leafless branches. “There’s a lot of things I can think of that scare me.”

The handsome stranger hummed a single note softly. “Such as?”

“Such as…” Akira sighed and with it, seemed to tumble whatever magic was keeping him weightless. His shoulders grew heavy. “...losing my father to his illness any day.” Wide, blue eyes snapped up to his profile, sharp and gentle all at once. “Becoming king and failing the people who are trusting in me, trusting my family. When we leave this place and return to the party, that all of this--” --he squeezed the hand in his own-- “--will end like a dream and I’ll be forced to ‘wake up.’”

_Whatever ‘this’...is._

“Wake up?”

“They are eager to marry me off to a...princess of their choosing. And she…” Akira chuckled bitterly. “...well, she’s very kind and definitely doesn’t deserve this arrangement.”

“I wasn’t aware anyone could force a prince or princess to do anything,” the young man behind the fox mask breathed.

“You’d be surprised.”

The stranger made a soft sound and bowed his head.

Akira turned to him. “But enough about me. You still haven’t told me _your_ name yet. Won’t you tell me who you are?”

The boy from the forest straightened sharply. “I…”

A tense silence speared between them.

But after several minutes, his companion began to relax. The rigid posture he held ebbed from his form and with a deep breath, the stranger’s lips parted. “I suppose...I could.” He nodded, as if to himself. “Very well. My name is--”

But the sharp tolls of the castle’s _rōkoku_ cut him off and ripped them both to silence for the second time that evening. At first, there was one. Then, there were two.

Three chimes soon followed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I couldn't _really_ have him tell Akira his name...........you understand................


	10. When You're Driving Through the Moonlight

Yusuke jerked to his feet, ripping his hand away from the prince’s grasp. His mouth flapped, at a loss for words. “...I have to go,” he breathed, dazed, as if still coming to this realization himself.

Four tolls, one after the other.

“What?” Akira chuckled. He followed suit and slowly rose to his feet.

“I have to go.” Yusuke spun to the prince. His heart hammered hard in his chest. His hands grasped at the edges of his _haori._ “You don’t understand. I only--”

Five tolls.

Ugh, he didn’t have the _time._ How could he have lost track?

_All magic has its limits._

“I’m sorry.” A quick, breathless bow. His feet scrambled backwards for the path out of the secluded garden. “Thank you, your highness, for a wonderful evening. I have dearly enjoyed every bit of it. But please, you must excuse me.”

“ _Wait_ \--!”

“I’m sorry!”

And as six tolls chimed from the water clock tower over all of the palace grounds, Yusuke Kitagawa fled the prince.

* * *

Seven tolls.

Yusuke breathlessly ran around the palace as fast as the snow and his _jikatabi_ boots would allow. When he reached the main courtyard, he exhaled in relief and excused himself profusely as he squeezed through the many guests standing about. He curbed the center square where several dancers were still slowly spinning and made his way around the tables full of fragrant food. He pushed forward towards the entrance and had to dodge around an unexpected body that almost tripped him--until he himself nearly ran into and tripped someone else--someone dressed in the finest of regal silks, pale pink and deep silvers. The older man’s mask was tilted up over his head and as their eyes caught from their near-collision, it occured to Yusuke how similar those greys were to Akira’s own.

Suddenly, he realized who this man was.

“Your Majesty!” he cried in horror and instantly, as if struck, he dropped low into a bow. “I’m so sorry. Please, forgive my rudeness.”

Eight tolls.

King Sakura chuckled and waved a hand. “It’s so crowded here, anyway. It’s already hard to walk. Don’t trouble yourself over it.”

Yusuke nodded and kept his head turned down. He moved to weave around him and continue his exit.

But something burning deep inside him made him turn around.

“Your Majesty?”

“Hm?”

King Sakura’s eyes moved to his.

Yusuke swallowed hard. His fingers tightened in the sleeves of his _haori_ . “You should know...how much your son loves you.” Was he surprised that his eyes stung as he thought of the prince? And why? He blinked hard. Perhaps it was the clash of two warring voices in his head:  Madarame’s harsh reminder that _this is where royalty walks,_ and his own common sense that _a lowly servant boy will never get this chance again._

So he took hold of this opportunity, this one moment--just like he had this whole magical, lovely night--and grasped it with everything he had.

“He would truly do anything for you. Your son Akira is the kindest and bravest man I have ever met.”

The king’s eyes widened by a fraction. “Is that so?” He raised a hand to the small line of a beard along his jaw. His brows furrowed and his eyes grew heavy.

Nine tolls.

Yusuke bowed low again. “I hope that you are proud of him. I am sure he will make a great king someday.” His breath hitched and he backed away. “Please, excuse me…!”

The king blinked. His mouth opened as if to respond, but Yusuke had turned and hurried off.

He could hardly breathe as he reached the many stairs leading down the hill and to the small drive where the horses and carriages waited. It was too difficult to try and jog down the stone steps while peering through the two eye-holes of his fox mask. Grateful that there was no one else around, Yusuke slid the mask off and held it in his hand. With the world peripherally open to him, he ran as fast as he dared.

He heard behind him a desperate and familiar, “Wait!” and before he could stop himself, Yusuke glanced over his shoulder to see the prince upon the highest step. He gasped and fumbled with the mask to slip it over his face again.

He was not prepared for when it suddenly slipped from his fingers.

_Clink._

_Clink._

_Crack._

Chipping and denting with every bounce, the _inari_ mask tumbled down the stone stairs ahead of Yusuke’s feet and on the final step, split into two.

* * *

Ten tolls.

* * *

Akira Sakura’s fingers followed the curve of the half of the _inari_ mask that had been hastily left behind. His heart still pounded restlessly against the front of his ribcage in the aftermath of the chase. When he raised his eyes to the shadowed trail down which his mysterious stranger’s horse had galloped, he could feel the first gentle snowflakes fall to the tip of his nose.

“Akira!” he could hear Ryuji’s voice call behind him. His faithful guard captain clambored to his side, out of breath. “What was _that_ about? You all right?”

Akira found himself nodding before his friend had even finished speaking. “Yeah,” he swallowed. He looked down to the jagged edge of the painted face of a fox. When he lifted his eyes again, he was smiling. He could feel it spreading wide and warm on the front of his face. “More than all right, actually,” he breathed and he pressed the half of the mask that remained to his chest.

Behind them, eleven tolls spilled into the silence from the castle’s _rōkoku._

* * *

By the time the twelfth and final toll chimed, true to Morgana’s word, Yusuke’s clothes were back to the raggedy old ones that they had once been before their magical transformation. Panting doggedly as he and his horse neared Madarame’s estate, Yusuke could feel the first few drops of snow crown the top of his head. And though he couldn’t feel enough breath within his lungs to do so, though he was back to being cold and dirty and so, so tired, he began to laugh. He tilted his head back and felt the snow dust his cheeks and he laughed and laughed and laughed.

He half-hoped the sound reached the _bakeneko’s_ ears that had changed his life so, wherever that impossible cat was.

He hoped Morgana knew just how grateful he was.

* * *

In the days following the palace’s celebrations, Yusuke could not stop dancing.

With every sweep of his broom and every dash of his feather duster, it was as if the young man were moved by a song only he could hear. Every chore became a new opportunity to relive the events of that incredible night. Every errand became a chance to close his eyes and remember the feel of the prince’s hand in his own when they danced, when they ran, when they talked. He found himself spinning down the halls late at night, when students and master had long since gone to bed. He found himself humming in easy remembrance the notes of the _gagaku_ to the firm beat of washing clothes and wiping down tables.

It was as if a quiet and contented happiness had taken root inside him and he could not rid himself of it--nor did he want to.

“My, Yusuke, you’re in a good mood,” some of Madarame’s students noted with giggles in their breath.

Yusuke merely chuckled and shook his head. “I’ve just had an excellent dream. That’s all.”

The days turned to weeks and Yusuke was so caught up in his own joy and contentedness in the aftermath of that unforgettable evening, he didn’t notice the frustration and anger that was boiling right under the same roof where he worked until it was too late.

* * *

“It isn’t _fair_!”

“ _Life_ isn’t fair, boy.”

“You just can’t admit to it, can you?! I _saw_ our paintings at the castle! I _saw_ the displays! You put them _all_ under your name! Not one of them was attributed to any of us.”

“Such things are the price for success. If my name was not attached to your works, do you think you would have been able to _showcase_ them? Do you honestly think anyone would care to see the works of nobodies? Your art _needs_ my name.”

“God, just _listen_ to yourself! Do you hear this? You’re so full of yourself!”

“And you’re full of _naivety_ if you honestly think your work is good enough on its own to achieve any sort of merit! _Talent_ isn’t what puts your work on walls! It’s _connections_.”

“That’s a load of--”

“--what about the pieces that _were_ sold, huh, Sensei? Whose pockets did that money line? Certainly not ours! I haven’t seen a single _cent_ after my portrait was bought!”

“Nor have I!”

“Yeah!”

Yusuke wasn’t sure what to do with himself. He grasped the broom with both hands tightly, hovering at the back of the studio. He watched the students argue against their master with surprise.

This...had never happened before.

“You are all still so young and _still_ so foolish. None of you understand the way of the world yet--”

“--and _you’re_ a pompous old ass! You think you know everything!”

“I can’t believe this…”

A part of him deep down knew it was marvelling for a completely different reason:  he hadn’t been aware Madarame could be talked to like this. At least, not without receiving some sort of reciprocal punishment.

“If this is the way this is going to be, Sensei, then count me out. I can’t stand to live here anymore and watch _you_ reap the benefits of _my_ blood, sweat, and tears. I _quit_.”

Yusuke jerked, as if struck.

“Me too!”

“I can’t stand it. I can’t _believe_ that we worked so hard--that _all_ of us worked _so hard_ \--only to never get recognized for it...”

“You’re _despicable_ , Sensei.”

“If this was going to be how it would always be, I think I would have killed myself.”

Someone threw down their brushes first, the small wood clattering to the floor. And then after one student started it, several more followed:   _clack, clack, clack, clack, clack._ The endless collision of brushes to the wooden floorboards underneath their socked feet.

Madarame’s face was bright red, except for a thin line around his tight-pressed lips where his skin burned a clear white. He didn’t say a word.

“...good-bye, Sensei.”

Then, one by one, they left.

Even Natsuhiko.

Each of Madarame’s students walked him by while their once-teacher stared resolutely forward. A few stopped and bowed out of some semblance of lingering respect, but most charged right around him and on out of the room without so much as a second glance.

Yusuke didn’t realize how big the estate’s studio was until it was devoid of others to fill it. Until Madarame spoke into the reverberating quiet to ask, “...are you going to leave me, too, Yusuke?”

And Yusuke...didn’t know.


	11. Lavender's Blue, Dilly Dilly

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the first scene in this chapter is rather important to me, for reasons I think only a young and bright-eyed version of myself could articulate
> 
> also, did u know patrick doyle, who composed the 2015 cinderella score, is so good? he's so good

“Your highness,” Tae Takemi bowed the moment the prince entered. Her voice was soft and mindful. “You’re just in time.”

The part of Akira that had feared arriving too late eased inexplicably. He turned behind him to Ryuji, wide-eyed on his heels. Without another word, Ryuji nodded and ushered out the doctor and all of the other remaining attendants still hovering inside the king’s bedchamber.

Before he slid the panel shut, Ryuji murmured, “Knock if you need anything, bud,” and Akira numbly nodded.

The screened door drew closed.

Futaba looked up from where she was kneeling on the other side of their father. Her face was cherry-red and streaked with tears. She gasped and sniffled and in the next second, without even fully being aware that he had moved, Akira was at her side. He wrapped his arms around her and held her tight.

“Akira.”

The weakness in his father’s once-strong breath made something pang hard inside his chest. 

Akira loosened his hold on his sister and turned. He rubbed at an eye. “I’m here,” he whispered to the man lying before them, swathed in the finest of blankets and silks. Akira had a brief moment of gratitude for Tae and her assistants. They spared no expense in making sure the king would be as comfortable as possible.

“I am...sorry I pulled you away from your practice--”

“--no.” Akira shook his head and set his jaw. He swallowed hard. “Don’t be.”

He would rather be here by his father’s side rather than anywhere else in their lands right now.

No contest.

Sojiro sighed and the effort weighed his body down. He blinked slow. “...so many things...I wanted to say…” he mused; his voice was little more than a tired whisper, “...so little time…”

“It’s okay,” Akira said. Futaba was beyond words, hiccuping and gasping with jagged inhales and exhales. She bunched a fist up against her eye. Akira put an arm around her and squeezed her shoulder. “You don’t have to say a thing.” 

“No,” Sojiro murmured and his next inhale was a clear bid for strength. “I do.”

He opened his eyes and pinned his son with them, something still unwavering and resolved behind his gaze. “I was wrong, Akira. I...admit it. I was wrong. And I’m sorry I will not be here...to make certain it is made right.” His chest rose not enough. “You should know...you were right.”

The world threatened to blur and distort before his eyes, but Akira blinked the fierce burn away. “Father…?”

“Perhaps the world should know kindness...and love...and mercy...before they know duty...responsibility...and law.” Sojiro swallowed. “Perhaps we should give a chance...to what is good before us, even if it is...different...than what we had anticipated.”

Futaba sniffed and dropped her hand. Her eyes were very glassy and very round.

The corner of Sojiro’s mouth twitched upward as he looked at them both. The pride and love in his eyes swam. “After all, it would seem...extraordinarily sad to me...if _ love _ ...doesn’t get the chance to do something great within our lives.”

Akira’s arm slipped away from Futaba’s shoulders. He jerked forward, both hands planted in fists against the floor before his knees. He leaned toward his father. “What...did you say?” 

“I think…” Sojiro turned his head to the ceiling. The small and faint smile on his face made him look peaceful, ready. “...I think we should get into the habit of showing a bit more kindness...now and then. Maybe...even than what is necessary.” 

He blinked once and slow. When he whispered next, Akira wasn’t sure he could see them; his grey eyes were so clouded.

“Find that boy, Akira,” Sojiro quietly urged. “The one from the forest. This is the last I can give you:  a thank you...and an apology...for all that you have had to find the courage...to put up with after all these years. I’m sorry I...cannot do more--”

“--no.” Akira shook his head fiercely and blinked hard against the tears that built in his eyes. He bent over his father and grasped the front of his  _ kimono _ in his hands, not quite sure when he had pulled close enough to the king’s side to touch him. He could feel every insufficient breath underneath his hands and couldn’t stop the water in his eyes from overflowing any longer. Tears dripped down his chin and pooled onto the silk over his father’s chest. His hands shook. “It’s enough. It’s  _ more _ than enough. Father--”

“I love you, Akira.”

“I-I love you, too.”

Futaba crawled closer. Sojiro’s eyes drifted to some place just behind her. 

“I love you, Futaba.”

“I love--!” Futaba gasped around a hard sob. She put her hand on his shoulder. “I love you too, Dad!”

The corner of Sojiro’s mouth twitched up again. “...’Dad’...” he whispered. His eyes raised to the ceiling. “I like that.”

Until the king breathed his last, Akira and Futaba steadfastly remained at his side.

* * *

The kingdom mourned its king and when the time for that grieving passed, it crowned another.

King Akira Sakura had been fearing his own reign for a long time. But when it finally came, the coronation and celebration of his ascent to the throne went by quickly. All too soon, he received pressing visits from the head royal advisor that were incredibly similar to their meetings when he was still a prince:  insistences to marry, considerations of what the next war should be, etc, etc. 

It appeared to Akira that there might not have been much of a difference between the two stations, other than a fancier title. 

“Have you thought any more about what I have said, Your Majesty?”

Akira twisted a lock of dark hair between his fingers and pressed his lips closed in front of an aggravated sigh. 

Ryuji, ever at his side, groaned enough for the both of them. Kneeling and with his arms crossed over his chest, the guard captain’s mouth downturned sharply. “Really, when are you going to give it a  _ rest _ , Shido? Akira--”

“-- _ his Majesty _ \--”

“-- _ Akira, _ ” Ryuji intentionally drew out, “will decide who he’s ready to marry and  _ when  _ he’s ready to marry them in his own time. End of discussion.”

Shido shook his head. “King Okumura has been more than merciful after that  _ stunt  _ at the post-war celebrations. He is still willing to work with us to make some sort of arrangement. This is an opportunity we cannot afford to pass, your Majesty. The kingdom  _ needs  _ a secure future. The people need to know the throne will continue and the best way we can assure them of that is by providing an heir. Nothing less will do.” 

“You seem to think you know what everybody else wants,” Ryuji mumbled under his breath.

“I know what keeps the people happy.”

“Do you? Do the ‘people’ stop you in the streets and regularly say, ‘Hey, I’d really feel a lot better if that king had a wife and baby already. His personal life isn’t really much of my business but I’ve made it a concern that the entire foundation of _mine_ revolves around.’”

“You’re an insufferable  _ brat. _ ”

“And  _ you’re _ a--”

Akira sighed and dropped his hand away from his hair and to his knee, cutting the both of them to silence. “I’ve already decided, anyway,” he murmured. 

Shido jerked forward, but didn’t get up from his knees. “You have?”

The king’s eyes drifted to the half of the  _ inari  _ mask he still retained, lying prone beside his leg. When he looked up next, he steeled himself with the courage his late father’s words had left him and said, “The one I’ll marry is the one who has the other half of this mask.” He picked up face of the fox and held it before himself. “That is my final decision.”

The head royal immediately frowned. “But your Majesty, you  _ know  _ the scandal that would occur, what people will do. There will be fake replicas everywhere. Ones in uncanny likeness. How would you ever be able to tell the true face that lied behind the mask all this time?”

“I will know who it is the instant I see him,” Akira muttered and placed the mask back on the floor beside his leg.

Shido’s face twisted as if he had tasted something sour. “And do you _... _ truly  _ love _ this man, your Majesty?”

“I don’t know,” Akira answered honestly, softly. He added, “But I want to give myself at least the  _ chance _ to.”

Ryuji did nothing to hide his smug grin.

Shido glanced to the guard captain. He cleared his throat and let his frown deepen. “Well. Forgive me for being…. _ pragmatic _ ,” he muttered. “But what if you never find him? What if this person refuses to come forward? Then you’ll find you’ve wasted the kingdom’s resources and time all for your own vain endeavors.”

Akira bit the inside of his cheek. This, too, had plagued him late into the night. “If he does not come forward or I cannot find him, then I will agree to marry her royal highness Haru Okumura.” 

Ryuji jolted. 

“That’s an acceptable compromise, wouldn’t you agree?” Akira couldn’t bring himself to meet his best friend’s wide-eyed gaze.

“Very well.” Shido breathed easier. He let his deep inhale and exhale roll through him slowly. But the set of his shoulders still spoke volumes of how unhappy he was with this. “What will you have me tell the people, then?” 

* * *

The royal proclamation went out to all the land.

By the time the news of the king’s affections reached the ears of a loyal servant boy faithfully and kindly tending to his master’s estate, several people had already lined up and attempted to impress his Royal Majesty of their own half of the now-infamous  _ inari  _ mask. None had been convincing, but hope buzzed through the townspeople with fervor and zeal. 

Yusuke could hardly dare to believe it all. 

His ears burned with every word he spoke even as he reiterated to Madarame the news he had managed to hear from his travels to the  _ jokamachi  _ to sell the last of his horses. Yusuke tried not to let his hands shake as he recounted everything:  the decree, the number of those who had tried and failed, the rumors of just who this person was and whether or not they were safe for the kingdom or a foreign and veiled threat.

“So the king hasn’t found his masked stranger yet?” Madarame muttered with a thoughtful bend to his brow.

Yusuke shook his head. He forced his hands to still and clasped them together before him. “No.”

Madarame made a sound both amused and derisive from his nose. “You seem rather excited about all this, Yusuke.”

“Oh, no,” Yusuke shook his head again, but his heart betrayed him deep in his chest. The rapid  _ pound  _ of it against his ribcage that dared to ask:  would Akira extend his search even beyond the  _ jokamachi _ ? What a dangerous and wonderful thought! Did Yusuke have a chance all the way out in the middle of the forest in Madarame’s estate? Or would he have to come forward--did he have the  _ courage  _ to come forward? Would anyone believe him? “It just...seems delightfully fanciful, doesn’t it? Like something out of a fairytale.”

Madarame’s mouth downturned with a displeased hum. “Yes. I suppose so.”

Yusuke spent the night staring at the other half of the  _ inari  _ mask he cradled in his fingers. He wondered what the consequences would be of literally unmasking himself. Would Akira accept him? Would he feel betrayed that Yusuke had fooled him again when all along he really had been just a servant boy?

And what would become of Madarame? 

What  _ should  _ become of Madarame?

The questions grew too many and too numerous to answer all at once and when Yusuke finally turned over to fall to sleep, he wondered if the shadow he briefly saw at the entrance to his painted attic was a trick of the light or his overexcited imagination.


	12. In My Own Little Corner

“So all along, you too were going to leave me, Yusuke.”

Yusuke’s head jerked up. His jaw dropped in aghast shock. His eyes flew back the way he came--down the ladder from the empty stables to his little attic above, and to where he knew Madarame’s estate to be--a place he had _thought_ the man was sleeping--before they fell back to the slumped form of his master perched carefully on his own low haystack of a bed.

The broken half of the _inari_ mask was cradled in his hands.

Yusuke’s heart leapt into his throat. He took a quick step forward. “No, Master. I had no intention of--”

Madarame scoffed, a loud sneer that cut off any other words Yusuke might have wanted to say. “ _Don’t_ lie to me, boy,” he muttered. With slow and careful movements, the artist stood and held out the mask. “Not when you’ve been so carefully painting and crafting this _exact copy_ of the fox's face everyone’s talked about. I’m no _fool_.”

Yusuke found his mouth flapping for words. “It--it’s not a fake.”

Madarame’s shoulders shook with a bitter laugh.

“It’s true,” Yusuke insisted. “I mean no joke. That mask is real _._ ”

Sharp eyes took in the earnest look in Yusuke’s own, then darted to the mask he held in his hands. He looked it over once more, carefully.

Slowly, the cloud of doubt peeled back from Madarame’s face and something else slid over his features entirely.

“But...how…?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“How do _you_ \--” Madarame sneered as he gestured the mask towards the boy. “-- _you_ , a mere _servant_ boy, have this mask, out of everyone else?”

For one moment, Yusuke debated telling him the truth. He wondered if Madarame would believe him:  the tale of a hungry _bakeneko_ , and the reciprocated kindness that lead to the most unbelievable and magical of nights.

“It was given to me,” he finally said.

Again, the artist scoffed, a heavy and warped sound, like something tight and angry was caged and writhing inside the man’s throat. Madarame turned his back to Yusuke. His fist gripped tight the jagged-edged _inari_ mask. “‘Given,’” he repeated with a hiss, before his voice softened to an incredulous whisper, “...of course. The ‘friend’ in the castle...”

There was a long stretch of silence before Madarame spoke again. When he did, it was carefully, softly. “Perhaps Fate is smiling upon me. There may yet be a way to turn this around.”

“...Master…?”

Whether Madarame turned at the call or for a different reason entirely, Yusuke didn’t know. Suddenly, Madarame faced him with a stern set to his mouth and a determined gleam in his eyes. “The way I see it, we have a few options ahead of us, Yusuke.” He marched closer and passed the mask from hand to hand. “You _could_ go to the king. You could reveal to him that _you_ are his ‘mysterious stranger’ he has been so desperately looking for.”

When Madarame stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the boy, he lowered his voice. His face tightened in sympathy. “But what are the chances the king would keep to his word? Once he sees you’re nothing but a _servant_ , surely he’ll change his mind about you.”

Yusuke’s chest iced over. His hands fisted at his sides. He turned his gaze away, unable to look his master in the eyes, but Madarame pulled his face back with a hand on the boy’s cheek.

It was the first time Madarame had touched him in years.

Madarame’s hand was ice cold.

“Or,” the artist murmured, “we can spare the kingdom and its king a great deal of embarrassment by pretending the whole night never happened.”

Yusuke’s brow furrowed. “...what?”

“You’ll stay here,” Madarame said, “in this attic, until this whole business with the ‘mysterious stranger’ has blown over. In the meanwhile, _I_ promise to keep your identity a secret so as to spare both you and the king this horrible, scandalous shame. And in return for my silence, _you’ll_ continue my work.”

“Your...’work’?”

“The _art_ , boy.” Madarame’s hand finally dropped from Yusuke’s face and gestured in a wide arc to the painted and sketched woodwork all around them in the dingy attic. “Though it pains me to admit it:  I might have been hasty in so quickly denying you your chance to show the world your talent before it could fully develop. I’m impressed by what I see here, Yusuke. Your skills certainly are promising.”

...promising...?

“With a little more practice, you could be a _renowned_ painter. Just like your mother always wanted to be.”

Yusuke blinked hard.

He turned. His eyes roamed over the work he had spent many late nights over, pouring his heart into. The drafty living space he had been forced to call home; the place had wanted to make into one he would _love_ because everything he kept bundled inside from day to day was brushed into the woodwork. His very _heart_ was on display among those colored wood planks.

...and it was...good?

“What do you say, Yusuke?” Madarame asked, stepping behind the young man. “A poor creature such as yourself could never hope to claim the heart of a king, but at least you can have _this_ \--the chance to do something _great_ with your life. Surely this is something which you have always wanted?”

Yusuke bowed his head.

Breath was suddenly very hard to come by in the little attic.

“Paint for me, Yusuke,” Madarame urged. “I promise, your life will be--”

“--no.”

Madarame froze, stunned to silence. “...no?” he repeated, low and soft.

Yusuke turned around to face the artist, an imploring look on his face. “Don’t...misunderstand. Your offer is kind and I would be _honored_ to finally be your student, Master, after all this time.” And he meant that; from the bottom of his heart, Yusuke meant that. “And maybe the pri--the king--” He took a deep breath and begged for courage from some unseen place inside of him. “--maybe he _will_ deny me. Maybe he will take back his affections once he sees who I really am.”

_Leave that for me to decide._

His hands tightened over one another in hope from a winter forest-born memory. It was what had both started and changed everything. “But I believe I should _give myself_ that chance. However foolish it may be.”

His words lingered in the loft space somewhere between them.

“I want to--”

\-- _smack._

The world jerked sideways.

The second time Madarame had touched him in years was not as kind and gentle as the first.

“You _fool_ ,” Madarame breathed. “You really would abandon me. After all I’ve done for you; after all I’ve offered…”

“No,” Yusuke swallowed around the tight lump in his throat. He turned to the elder man, his reddened cheek stinging. “I wouldn’t.” He blinked hard and spoke through the ringing pain, “I haven’t forsaken you, even after everything. Doesn’t that instill even a _little_ bit of your faith in me? Surely you must trust that I would ensure you were cared for and--”

“-- _enough!”_ Madarame roared and Yusuke winced. He pulled back.

“I have heard enough,” the artist continued. His chest heaved for breath; his face hot and red and angry. When he turned, he raised the half of the fox-face he still held and bashed it against a wooden beam framing the entryway to the attic.

The ceramic mask shattered.

“ _No!”_ Yusuke cried, his hands caught somewhere between reaching and withdrawing into himself. “Why?!”

Madarame spun and pointed a finger into Yusuke’s flinching face. “If you won’t do as you’re told; if you _refuse_ to see yourself for what you really are, then you have no business having the ‘chance’ to be anything at all!” he shouted. In a whirlwind of his olive green _haori_ , the artist moved for the exit to the attic. He climbed down to the lower level of the stables and marched for the sliding door at the front.

Yusuke scrambled to follow on his heels.

“No, wait!”

By the time he reached the barn door, it had slid shut with a clatter behind Madarame.

“Please!”

There was a distinct and familiar _click_ of a lock on the other side.

“ _No! W_ _ait!”_

* * *

“Ryuji, we’re running out of time…”

“You think I don’t know that, Makoto? We’re workin’ as fast as we can. It’s _hard_ weedin’ through all these assholes who’re claiming they’re the mysterious stranger."

"Now that we’ve opened this search to servants and staff..."

"Speakin’ of, why the hell are we doing that? I thought you said your guy was a prince, Akira.”

“I may have...assumed...because of various circumstances--”

“Please, for the love of all that is holy and good, stop moving, your Majesty.”

Akira bit his cheek and reluctantly let go of the lock of raven hair he had been twirling. Such commands were easier heard than followed when his guard captain and lieutenant were in the middle of updating him on their very important search efforts. That they were conducting this briefing during his first official portrait session as king was decidedly less important.

Ryuji waved a hand at the bowl-haired young man behind the wide easel, a pinched frown on his face. “Look, just _give_ us a sec, okay?”

The artist rolled his eyes but finally put down his brushes and palette with a low grumble.

Akira sighed. “No luck with the Iwai family?”

Makoto shook her head. “His only son, Kaoru, was the only one in the household who might have matched your description, but he had no mask and was quick to claim he wasn’t the one from that evening.”

“Gotta appreciate the kid’s honesty,” Ryuji murmured with a roll of his shoulder. “It’s been a rare thing these days.”

With every ‘no,’ Akira was beginning to feel more and more as if the whole world was against the two of them. Buffeted about at every turn. Misdirected and interrupted. Continually prevented from knowing one another.

...should he just accept that the boy from the forest didn’t _want_ to be found…?

Akira pressed his lips together briefly. “And the Mifune’s?”

“No one in that household matched,” the guard captain supplied, crossing his arms over his chest. “And yes, we checked the servants. Same with Madarame. Old guy’s living by himself now, ya hear? Strange, 'cuz I _distinctly_ remember a long list of names after his on the night of that party, but whatever…”

“...wait, what did you say?”

Three pairs of eyes looked curiously at one another, before deciding the voice wasn’t theirs. They lifted their heads to the bowl-haired artist peeking around his large canvas towards their huddle. He wore a tight frown.

Ryuji blinked. “Uh, I said that I thought I remembered hearing a long list of names--”

“--no, not that. Before.”

Ryuji frowned and tried to recall his own words.

Makoto stepped forward. “That Madarame is living by himself?”

The artist frowned. “That can’t be right…” he murmured to himself.

“What can’t be right?”

It was a moment before the bowl-haired young man spoke. He took his time, drawing himself up. “I used to work for Madarame. I was one of the ones that left him, but I remember...I remember there was one servant boy who stayed behind." With a shake of his head, the young man said, "Madarame shouldn’t be alone in that estate. There’s _definitely_ someone else there. I owe him.”

“Who?”

“A young man. His name is Yusuke Kitagawa.”


	13. Strong

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> heRE WE GO YOU GUYS

Ichiryusai Madarame had already played host and entertained and humored the king’s soldiers once. He was not expecting or wanting to see them again; he had other priorities before him in the form of the half-packed bags by his door and his scattered crates of canvases. But when he saw the king’s decorated horses march up the snowed path to his estate, he put on his widest, most humble smile, and slid open the front door. He stepped out and bowed as low as his back would allow when their troop came to a stop.

This would all be over soon.

“Good evening, my lords,” he greeted. “How may I yet be of service to you all?”

The young woman at their front with short brown hair slid a fierce glare to the unnatural blonde as soon as the guard captain opened his mouth. A beat later and the young man snapped his jaw shut tight and grudgingly let her speak with a rather loud roll of his eyes.

“We’re sorry to trouble you for a second time, Sir Madarame,” the lieutenant spoke sweetly and formally, “but it was brought to our attention we may have missed someone the last time we were here.”

“Missed someone?” Madarame’s surprise was not entirely faked. “Well, I must apologize on behalf of whoever told you such things. I don’t know who else they were counting--perhaps that black cat that’s been seen ‘round the property lately. But these days, it’s only me here in my humble estate. Like I told you before, all of my students have left me.”

“There’s no one else here?” the young woman hedged. Her eyes darted behind Madarame and to the closed screen door behind him. “Not even any servants or staff?”

Madarame shook his head. “None.”

The blonde guard captain narrowed his eyes at him. Then, without preamble, he slid off his horse. The snow crunched underneath his booted feet. He handed the reins to another dark-haired soldier just behind him and marched forward with knobbled grace. “In that case, maybe you won’t mind us lookin’ around your house a bit, yeah? Just to make sure.”

The artist startled but the guard captain didn’t appear to see. He strode right on past Madarame and pushed open the panel door behind him.

“But my lord--” Madarame turned but the blonde was gone. His footsteps were noisy, clambering through his house.

At least he had the courtesy to slip off his dirtied boots before he did so.

The brunette, still sitting astride her horse, turned in the saddle. Her deep auburn eyes peered at the packed bags behind the artist, before they roamed over the other buildings on his estate grounds. She first pointed to the low single-floor stretch on her left. “What’s that building for, sir?”

“It used to be my dorms,” Madarame muttered. His eyes darted behind him again. The blatant _nerve_ of these soldiers _._ “It’s the newest addition to the estate over the past few years. I had to have it constructed when the building you see behind me could no longer house the number of students I boarded and taught; however, as I _said,_ it is now completely empty. There’s no one left to teach.”

The lieutenant nodded, pursing her lips. With a gesture of her hand, three of the soldiers behind her guided their horses towards the single-story dormitory. She then turned her gaze right. “And that?”

“My--my stables. It, too, is completely empty. Economies had to be taken after the loss of my students, you see. It’s kept locked these days,” Madarame huffed. He tried not to let the panic rise in his voice. “What’s the meaning of this? I tell you the truth that there’s nothing and no one here, and yet you threaten to turn my entire _estate_ upside-down for no reason at all!”

The blonde strode back through the open sliding doorway at the front and stepped up behind the artist. “Well, he’s at least telling the truth _here_. There’s nobody else in this house, Makoto.” Madarame could feel the burn of his almond gaze on his back as the young man added, “Course, looks like there isn’t going to be _anybody_ here at all pretty soon.”

Makoto nodded. “That just leaves his stables…” she murmured and she pinned Madarame with her gaze. “Will you unlock it for us, then?”

The artist frowned heavily at her. He shook his shoulders. “Why should I? I entreat you to my estate in the middle of important work and in you walk like you _own_ the place and refuse to take me at my word. I must say, I’m _appalled_ at the manner of the king’s men.”

“Please, sir,” the one named Makoto insisted with a furrow to her slender brow. She had a hand held up and that’s when Madarame realized that the guard captain was no longer behind him but now at his side, an angry look across his youthful face. “We don’t mean to intrude, but by the mission given to us, we _can’t_ leave any stone unturned. We are to check every household and _every_ civilian to find the bearer of the broken mask.”

“Under whose authority? This is _my_ estate. I don’t have to open those doors up for anyone--”

“--how about by order of the king himself?”

Madarame froze at that voice.

The soldier holding the reins of the guard captain’s horse took off his iron helmet and lifted his face with a slight but wicked curve to his mouth. He shook out his dark and curly hair before he met Madarame’s gaze with twin pairs of cool and calm greys.

“Y-your Majesty…!” the artist breathed and sagged as if deflated, lowering himself to a deep bow.

King Akira Sakura, every bit straight-backed and regal even in a foot soldier’s armor and garb, didn’t deign to dip his head. He turned to the stables and said lightly, curiously, “As I understand it, my lieutenant has requested you unlock those doors for her so she can fulfill her duty to me. I think it’d work best if you acquiesced, Sir Madarame. I wouldn’t want to delay you further when you are clearly already so eager to be free of this place.”

Madarame bowed again, this time, stiffly. “...as...the king wishes,” he muttered quietly. He glanced over to the guard captain and lieutenant, who had also dismounted her horse, and dug his ring of keys out from under his sash with a heavy sigh.

When he reluctantly and slowly walked to the stables, they followed.

And when he opened the doors and lead them inside, perhaps he shouldn’t have been surprised to see a pale and curious face peering down at them from the attic high above them, grasping with white-knuckled hands the door-frame to his room. Of course he would have heard the commotion of visitors and the _chink_ of the lock on the stable doors finally coming undone.

Of course Yusuke Kitagawa wouldn't just follow orders and _not be seen_.

As soon as the king’s lieutenant and guard captain stepped forward, they spotted the boy peeking out through the shadows a floor above.

The guard captain turned his eyes to the artist’s profile, something searing and fiery in their earth-brown depths. “And you were just going to _move_.”

* * *

Makoto Niijima climbed up the ladder to the attic space with careful feet.

The young man who she supposed was Yusuke Kitagawa watched her carefully, standing an arm’s length away. When she rose to her feet on the landing, he clasped his hands before himself and bowed. But any greetings Makoto may have wanted to give him were swept away by the blankets, the overturned crates--all the signs of life lived as best as possible in this chilly little loft. But even more:  she couldn’t take her eyes away from the painted woodwork all around her.

She lifted her head, her mouth falling slack in awe. The intricate scratchings of pale camellias set against a myriad of greens. Yellows in bursting sun-rays high overhead. To the right, a hazy image of falling leaves and autumn caught in torrid hues. A recognizable palace garden delicately laden with snow was set against the back wall.

Makoto stepped further into the attic space, craning her head high. Her eyes swept over it all.

“ _Ryuji!_ ” she called and the young man named Yusuke jumped at the sudden shout of her voice. “You need to come see this.”

Once she could hear the guard captain clamber for the ladder, Makoto looked to Yusuke. Her mouth felt dry. “Did you...do all this?”

The young man wouldn’t look to her. He kept his head bowed, his hands folded before him. He nodded.

Ryuji reached the landing behind her with a curse and a breathy, “Whoa…”

Makoto evaluated the young man. He was dirtied and his blue-black hair was askew. He wore simple, navy cotton and an equally as dark _haori_ ; no elegant and silver-threaded silks of lavender blue. This Yusuke Kitagawa was certainly no prince.

And yet.

“Who are you?” she asked into the quiet.

The young man took a deep breath. “Yusuke Kitagawa, my lady.” He bowed again, low and graceful. “Your humble servant.”

“Well, Yusuke,” Ryuji muttered from behind Makoto with a grin thick in his voice. “Seems like it’s your lucky day. C’mon. I think there’s someone outside who wants to see you.”

Ocean blue eyes darted up before they could remember their place. Yusuke jerked his gaze back downward towards the floorboards; his Adam’s apple bobbed in a thick swallow. “He--they would?” he asked, his voice breathy and wonder-filled.

Makoto nodded. Something in her chest inexplicably eased. “Yes,” she said and she couldn’t stop the small smile that stretched across her face. “Won’t you come with us? He’s been waiting for you for an awfully long time.”

Relief and ache simultaneously tightened onto that pale face.

With a hard blink, Yusuke nodded.

Makoto gestured with an arm for Yusuke to walk by them and be the first to descend the ladder. Though he was taller than either of them, the young man had a way of making himself seem rather small. When his back was turned to them, Ryuji snapped his almond-colored eyes to Makoto’s auburns and mouthed with pointing fingers to over-gesture, ‘It’s him! It’s him!’

‘I know!’ Makoto mouthed back and shoved her superior’s shoulder playfully in a lighthearted simper.

She couldn’t blame either of them for being unable to stop smiling.

* * *

“Where do you think _you’re_ going?”

Madarame’s voice boomed over the empty stables and to the young man quietly making his way to the open door he stood beside. Yusuke flinched and stopped in the middle of the floor. His hands tightened into fists at his sides. His downturned brow was furrowed, and he had the beginnings of a rare frown stretching across his lips.

“Why, presenting himself to his _king_ , of course,” Ryuji casually answered as he swung down the ladder. He landed with most of his weight on one leg and spun around with a lackadaisical grin. “Y’know, like we _told_ you everyone had to. Like, the first time we were here.”

Madarame’s jaw flexed. The grim set to his mouth thinned and strained.

Ryuji came up behind Yusuke and patted his back once, encouragingly. “C’mon,” he urged, walking him by.

But when Yusuke moved to step past the once-golden Madarame, his old master snatched his arm. He ignored the warning calls of both lieutenant and guard captain on either side of them and hissed low in Yusuke’s ear, words slipping past his lips like remembered ghosts of dotted, crimson paint, “ _Remember_ your place, boy.”

And with all the delicacy of a discarded white mask, Yusuke asked, “Are you afraid, Madarame?” He turned his head to pin Madarame’s eyes with quietly brave blues. “Because I’m not. _I_ have no reason to hide.”

Something silent passed between them.

With a steep downturn to his lips, Madarame released his hold.

Yusuke turned away.

* * *

It was the first time Yusuke called him by name.

And it would be the last time he ever had to address him.

Madarame did indeed move far, far away--faster than anyone could catch him. He was never seen or heard from again.


	14. A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And for those who asked--I like to think that yes, Akira does go to see Yusuke's painted attic after their conversation. ;) It's just also, what I would picture, such a sweet and intimate moment, that it's one of those things I wanted to keep just between them.
> 
> Anywho, enjoy this last chapter and the following epilogue, my friends. It's been a lovely journey.

Quietly brave or not, Yusuke Kitagawa found that deep down, he was terrified to be before the king once more. What was he supposed to do? What was he to say? There was no _bakeneko_ or magic spells to help him this time. No mask to hide behind; no silken _bakama_ and sash to dress with. No other half of a fox’s face to present and prove himself by. Unbridled fears rose on the tide of Madarame’s voice in the back of his head with every _tabi-_ padded step through his old master’s house. Would the king still accept him, even seeing him for how and who he really was?  A lowly servant boy, easily painted over and meant to be forgotten?

He found Akira in the his mother’s old room. The same place Yusuke spent most of his young years in; the same place she died.

The king was kneeling, hands pressed to his thighs. His elbows angled outward, as if he were steeling himself. To his right lay half of the mask Yusuke had left behind on the palace stairs.

Yusuke quietly knelt down before him and placed his own hands on his knees. He bent his upper body low in as deep of a bow he could. “Your Majesty,” he greeted with a whisper. He straightened up after a weighty pause to see Akira’s face still wore a deep-set frown. Yusuke’s heart thudded hard. He bowed his head.

The silence stretched taut as a thread.

Akira cut it loose. “Tell me.”

Yusuke raised his eyes. His brow furrowed. “...I’m sorry…?”

“Tell me your story,” Akira murmured. “From the beginning. Who you are and where you came from.”

No more loose ends.

Yusuke’s next inhale rose his shoulders. His brow furrowed. “Does my king...truly want to hear a servant’s story?”

Something in Akira’s features finally softened. The greys in his eyes lessened their cloudy storm and softened into morning fog over dew-kissed fields. Yusuke was surprised he could still remember such an image from his countryside childhood.

“Yeah,” Akira breathed, soft and bare. “More than you know.”

* * *

So Yusuke started from the beginning, without the fanfare of ‘once upon a time’s’ and ‘in a far away land’s,’ but with the simple earnestness of ‘I’s’ and ‘me’s.’ He shared the story of a little boy and his sickly mother; of the renowned artist who took them in and shared his food and home. He talked of the long hallways he had grown to know and care for; the canvases and brushes and students he tended. His mother’s final and greatest painting which had been cruelly marred and his subsequent escape to the forest.

He spoke of the king. Of how much their first meeting meant to him; of how much hope he was given because of a little kindness.

Though he did not know if Akira would believe him, he talked about Morgana. He talked of magic that lasted until the final stroke of midnight and the impatient but warm _bakeneko_ that he owed everything to. He shared the departure of Madarame’s students and his own unspoken reason for staying, though Madarame tried to shut him away in fear of ‘chances’ and long-dormant dreams Yusuke was just beginning to dare to have for himself.

Above all, Yusuke talked about hope.

* * *

“You’ve been through much.”

Yusuke hummed a single note and fisted his fingers in his _hakama._ “Everyone has,” he murmured.

“But you’re not a prince.”

Yusuke’s lips twitched upward in a modest smile. “No. Only in my dreams, but even then, hardly.”

“And is your name really ‘Yusuke’? Yusuke Kitagawa?”

“It is.”

Akira nodded, as if to himself. His eyes lowered to the mask beside his knees and he lifted it with careful fingers. “And you have no mask to give me? Nothing with which to convince me you are who you say you are?”

Yusuke shook his head. “No. Nothing, Your Majesty.”

Silence fell between them.

Yusuke took a slow breath and lifted his eyes to meet the king’s. “Just my heart, should you wish to have it.”

Should the heart of a servant even _be_ so treasured by his king.

Akira pushed himself to his feet, fox mask in hand. Yusuke followed him with his eyes and lifted his chin. He watched as the king knelt closer, just within arm’s reach. When Akira gently placed the broken half of the mask over the right side of his face, he said nothing. He could feel the warmth of the king’s gaze as it followed the lining of a perfect and snug fit over his cheek, brow, and eye.

Then Akira whispered, “As long as you’ll take mine,” and wide ocean blue met a deep, smokey grey.

* * *

Yusuke didn’t know who leaned in first.

The mask pulled away, pressed gently to the wooden floorboards by his thigh. Suddenly and dizzyingly, there was no space left between king and lowly servant.

Akira’s lips pushed against his.

Everything else in the world around them began to matter a whole lot less.

* * *

Futaba screamed.

The instant she saw her brother ride up the trail to the castle, with an unfamiliar stranger perched on his same horse and wrapped between his arms, she let loose the loudest cry the palace had heard and jumped up and down. She ignored the warnings of her handful of maidens and attendants and hurried down the steps in her socked feet, a high note of joy and excitement stuck in her lungs.

The two walked inside, hand-in-hand.

“You found him! You found him!” she shouted and she bounced and ran straight down the hall and up to the tall, slender boy beside her brother. “Oh _heck,_ he’s so skinny!” The princess scrunched up her nose and pinched the stranger’s cheeks in her hands and pushed them up and down. “Lookit that!”

Akira gaped. “Futaba!”

His little sister giggled to herself and released her prisoner, who appeared every bit wounded and shocked. The boy from the forest lifted a pale hand to one of his reddened cheeks.

“Just breakin’ him in, Akira,” Futaba said with a wave of her hand. “Loosen up, yeah? I mean, I know you’re king and all now, but this guy’s gonna become my brother-in-law. He’s gotta get used to me as much as _I_ gotta get used to him, right?”

Both boys flushed bright red.

The blue-black haired young man turned elegantly away and Akira bowed his head to fiddle with a loose curl. It didn’t escape Futaba’s notice that they hadn't let go of each other’s hand.

“Futaba, we haven’t...talked about marriage yet,” Akira muttered.

His sister blubbered. “Wait, what do you mean? Wasn’t that the whole _point_ of trying to find the guy with the mask, anyway?”

“W-well, now that he’s _here_ , I--”

“--I wouldn’t…” the young man from the forest cleared his throat, face still turned to the side. He had a melodic and low voice, Futaba found; something distinguished and refined, for all of his poor man’s clothes he wore. “...I wouldn’t be... _opposed_...to marriage.”

If possible, Akira’s face turned an even _deeper_ shade of scarlet. He cleared his throat and shook his head. There was a shy smile on his face. “Either way, there’s no need for us to rush it. We have time _._ ”

The young man hummed a long note, as if in wonder. “We do, don’t we?” he murmured. 

Futaba watched as their eyes met again, bashful and tentative as if these two were still getting over the amazing fact they were _here_ and that this was _real._ In their faces, she could see the start of the gradual realization that if they should be so lucky, they might even be able to have this for _forever_.

She rolled her eyes and put it upon herself to stop them before the two even _thought_ about making out in front of her. She marched forward and sat her hands on her waist. WIth a dramatic toss of her head, she surveyed this mysterious stranger up and down. “So... _you’re_ the _inari_ everyone’s been talking about, then, huh?”

Ocean blues snapped to her quickly. They blinked once, then twice. “I--is that what people have been calling me?”

“Oh?” Futaba grinned cheekily and bent in. “Did you not know? Maybe I should just call you ‘ _Inari_ ’ from now on. After all, it’s not like you or my brother has been nice enough to do me the courtesy of introducing yourself yet.” She directed a thin glare at her older brother beside him.

Akira sighed and mumbled her name in tiresome warning again but Futaba turned her attention to the towering stranger when he huffed.

“I _do_ have a name,” he said, “Yusuke Kitagawa.”

Futaba tilted her head, unimpressed. “Mm. Nice.  _Inari's_ better.”

“ _Futaba_ ,” Akira repeated, in firmer warning this time.

But the princess giggled and ignored him, sticking out her hand to the young man named Yusuke. Her other hand she stuck to the small of her back. A sly, crooked grin crossed her face--one not too dissimilar from her brother’s. “Well, whatever your name is, I think we’re gonna get along _just fine,_ Inari. Welcome to the family.”

* * *

Despite what Madarame had said and despite what Shido had feared, the people in the _jokamachi_ and beyond that surrounded the Sakura castle took to the revelation of their king’s consort and future husband with little pushback (though this, it was thought, was mostly due to a handful of very good friends and a clever, conniving little sister who played a hand even from within the palace walls).

Winter slowly melted away and like a sleepy giant, the world thawed and awakened to remember spring. Snow turned to slush. The long-buried greenery hidden beneath sprouted through.

Their wedding was held under the first flower blooms of the _sakura_ in the rear palace gardens.

Three hundred and sixty painted seashells and a string of dazzling canvases later, all presented through a procession of artists both young and old who, despite what Yusuke had ever believed, had never forgotten the servant boy who once tended to their every need--and after some excited hollars and whoops and humble, happy vows--Akira and Yusuke were married.

The celebrations lasted for weeks. It seemed to the two as if everyone they knew--from the visiting princess Haru who had over the months become a steadfast friend, to the small, blue-eyed and black cat that darted through guests’ legs--wanted to be there, and they were happy to have them.

And though he himself would never admit it, if you asked Ann and Makoto, Ryuji was definitely the one who cried the most.

There were, of course, those like Shido who were not happy with this arrangement between a king and an artist’s servant boy, but, well--those people, few and far in between, didn’t ruin the celebrations. They just simply weren’t there.

And so love was given every chance to do something great within the lives of not only themselves, but throughout all of the kingdom itself.

And they all, very much, lived happily ever after.


	15. Epilogue

“I can’t believe you found it,” Yusuke breathed and let his fingertips run across the familiar face of his childhood. The pale yellow background was just as he remembered it:  soft and gently bright. The branch from the upper left corner that reached across the landscape, the heavy grey clouds that shrouded the lower left side, and the yearning face of a fictitious woman that he could remember his mother projecting so deeply onto.

It was all the same.

After all this time, his mother’s greatest work hadn’t changed beyond the cloud in the corner.

The raven-haired king kneeling beside him gave a humble shrug. “It took some searching and tracking, but we managed it. Or, should I say, _Haru_ did. She’s the one that eventually found it, had it purchased and then delivered to us. A ‘belated wedding gift,’ I think she called it.”

Yusuke chuckled. A soft smile spread his lips. “What an incredible woman. _We’re_ the ones that should be giving _her_ gifts. Isn’t her coronation fast approaching?”

Akira hummed. “It is.”

Yusuke shook his head with a rueful smile. He lifted his gaze to the wall before them, strung with portraits of the late Sojiro and his son and daughter to the left, with a larger spread of Yusuke and Akira’s wedding in the center. The span of mint-painted wall just to the right of the portrait of their grand procession had for so long been bare.

“Think she’ll be happy here with the others?” Akira asked.

“Yes.” Yusuke nodded with a small smile and turned to meet his king’s eyes with his own. “There’s nowhere else she’d rather be.”

* * *

**THE END**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like I should say something grand here, but all I have is a big thank you for you all. So I guess that's all I'll say.
> 
> Thank you for reading.
> 
> Thank you for all your kindness.
> 
> Thank you for your patience.
> 
> Thank you for letting love do something wonderful in my life.
> 
> (I hope it will do many more wonderful things in yours.)


End file.
